


Secret, The

by westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-03-01
Updated: 2009-03-01
Packaged: 2019-05-15 05:19:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 28,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14784273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist/pseuds/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist
Summary: Josh and Donna get drunk on Bartlets first election night and get married.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

Josh sighed and ran a hand over his face. He was just about to knock on the hotel room door when Donna’s voice stopped him.

“Wait a minute.” she said quickly. He looked over at her and saw that she looked scared.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“I’m just....” she began and trailed off.

“What?”

“She’s going to be really pissed off.” Donna said. “And she’s going to yell.”

“Probably. She’s dramatic.”

“She’s going to call us stupid.”

“I’d count on it.” he agreed.

“She’s going to think I’m stupid.” She said that last part quietly, dropping her gaze to the floor.

He sighed and looked at her. That made him nuts. He found himself thinking, and not for the first time since he met her, that he wanted to kick Dr. Free Ride’s ass for stripping her of her self-confidence. She had proven to him by the end of the first week that she was one of the smartest people he’d ever known, but she was stuck on this notion that intelligence equaled a college degree. He’d watched her confidence grow in the past ten months, but there were moments that she was still unsure.

“She’s not going to think you’re stupid.” he assured her. “She is, however, going to question your taste in men.”

“Josh.” she smiled. And he smiled in return. She was nervous, but she was smiling, and that was his goal.

“And I can take CJ, Donna.” Josh replied. “I’m not going to let her say anything mean to you, not that I think she would.”

She nodded in response and he finally knocked on the door. After a few moments, they heard movement from within and a very mussed up CJ answered the door.

“Morning, CJ.” Josh greeted.

“Idiot Boy.” CJ replied. Josh pushed by her and pulled Donna into the room with him, choosing not to rise to the bait. “What can I do for you? Aren’t we supposed to have today off?”

“We have the rest of week off.” Josh reminded. “But Donna and I are flying back to Washington in a little while, and we needed to talk to you first.”

“You’re going back today?” CJ asked.

“Yeah. I’m going to spend the rest of the week getting my life in order, and I promised Donna I’d help her find a place.” Josh explained.

“Well, I’m taking more time than that.” CJ replied. “I have to pack up my house, move all my stuff across the country and find another place to live.”

“CJ, you made a ton of money before you joined us. Can’t you just, like, get all new stuff and keep the stuff out there? You think you’re going to live in DC for the rest of your life?” Josh countered.

“I don’t really know at the moment, Joshua.” CJ replied sitting down on the edge of the bed. “It’s 7:30 in the morning on my day off. What the hell did you want?”

“Donna and I got married last night.” Josh blurted.

That certainly gave CJ pause. She looked from Josh to Donna a few times before she started laughing hysterically.

“Josh, what’s going on?” Donna asked apprehensively.

Josh shrugged and continued to look at CJ. “You all right there, CJ?” he asked.

“Oh God!” she laughed rubbing her eyes and calming down. “That was a funny one. What’d you lose a bet with Toby? You lose, you have to tell me you and Donna got married; he loses he has to tell me, I don’t know, Sam slept with a prostitute?”

“Not exactly.” Josh said crossing his arms across his chest. In the ten months since she’d known him, Donna had come to recognize that pose of his. He was gearing up for a fight.

CJ’s smile slowly fell, and she looked between them again.

“Oh shit, you’re serious?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Josh replied. CJ looked over at Donna for confirmation and she nodded.

“You got married?” CJ asked.

“Yes.” Donna replied.

“You got married?” CJ asked louder.

“You heard us the first time.” Josh said.

“Don’t get snarky with me, Joshua.” CJ hissed jumping up off the bed. “I can’t believe you did something like this. This is a disaster!”

“Why?” Josh challenged cocking his head to the side. That caught Donna’s attention. They had agreed this morning to have it annulled. They were rather drunk last night, and the Justice of the Peace apparently didn’t care so much about that.

“Because she’s your assistant, you idiot!” CJ shouted gesturing towards Donna. “How’s she going to work for you now? You’re the next deputy chief of staff of the United States, Josh. You’re screwing up and we haven’t even put our friggin’ pencils in a jar!”

Donna flinched a little and took a step back, but Josh stood his ground. He knew that CJ was going to fly off the handle, but he didn’t expect to get so mad about it. He was watching Donna’s reaction to CJ, and the more she looked intimidated, the more pissed off he got.

“You know you have to fix it, right, Josh?” CJ said lowering her voice. “You know if you want Donna to work for you, you have to get an annulment. Like now, before the inauguration.”

“We’re aware of that, CJ.” he said quietly.

“Yeah?” she asked forcefully.

“Yeah.” Josh replied. “I just wanted you to know just in case.”

“Well, consider me duly informed.” she bit back. “When are you telling Leo?”

“I’m not.”

“Excuse me?”

“If we’re getting an annulment, there’s no need to tell Leo.” Josh replied.

“Josh!” CJ cried.

“What’s the point?” Josh countered.

“Well....” CJ began, but trailed off. “I guess if you’re fixing it, there really is none.”

Josh nodded and he and CJ stared at each other for a few moments. CJ broke eye contact first and glanced over at Donna. It really was a shame, she thought, they really were a cute couple. And they’d always gotten along well. When Donna left the campaign, she’d never seen Josh more depressed. Of course, at that time, CJ was still relatively new to the campaign herself and didn’t know Josh all that well. In fact, she STILL didn’t know him very well. The only people on the campaign that seemed to know him well were Sam and Leo...and, well, Donna. Josh wasn’t one that seemed to let people in. But they worked well together, and if they wanted to work together, they couldn’t be married. Leo would never go for it.

“All right then.” Josh said quietly looking over at Donna. He began to lead her out of the room, but CJ stopped them.

“You’ll have it taken care of before the inauguration?” CJ asked.

Josh stopped and looked back at CJ for a moment. “Yeah.”


	2. Secret, The

Josh and Donna sat on the plane as they flew back to D.C. from New Hampshire. They hadn’t said much to each other since they left CJ’s hotel room. Each seemed lost in their thoughts.

“I blame Ginger.” Donna finally announced.

“For what?” Josh asked sticking the airplane magazine he was flipping through back in the seat pouch.

“Our predicament.” she answered waving her hand between them both.

“Why’s that?”

“Well, she hooked up last night and was in our room. That’s why I came down to your room.” Donna explained.

“Where we proceeded to get ridiculously wasted,” Josh replied. “and came up with the idea all on our own.”

“I guess.” Donna shrugged. “But if wasn’t for Ginger, I would have gone back to my room, gone to bed, and you and would be...”

She trailed off and looked at him. “Yeah.” he said quietly. Although Donna saw him grin slightly, it looked to her more like it was a look of regret. She didn’t like that. It made her think of what wasn’t going to be. So she turned to look out the window, hoping the tears pooling her eyes didn’t spill out.

The thing was, she knew she loved him. Somewhere in the ten months of craziness and working closely together, she fell in love with him. He was just so wonderful to her, taking her in, twice, giving her a job, a sense of purpose again; always watching out for her, answering her thousands of questions, taking her out for a drink after work, letting her ramble on and on about whatever inane thing sparked her interest at the time.

When she first realized she loved him, she thought maybe it was just rebound from Paul. He really had shredded her heart and sense of self-worth, and then there was Josh, pulling her back together again without even knowing it. But after ten months, she really didn’t think that was rebound.

She tried to tell herself that he was just really a nice guy, looking out for her. After all, she was a damn good assistant and he was a mess when she wasn’t around. But every now and then, she saw something different in his eyes. Like last night. The look in his eyes when the Justice of the Peace married them last night...she refused to believe it was the effects of the alcohol.

“The thing is, Donna,” he began. This was it, she thought squinting her eyes shut tightly. He was going to explain to her again why it couldn’t be and she was praying that he couldn’t hear her heart break. “I don’t want to fix it.”

Wait, what? She turned to look at him, not caring if he could see the tears. He didn’t want to fix it?

When Josh saw that she was fighting back crying, he lost all his resolve. Screw it, he thought. Drunk or not, nobody could force him to do something he didn’t want to do. And when he kissed her last night, he damn near cried. She was so sweet and so willing to be with him. They hadn’t slept together last night. Well, they had shared a bed, but they hadn’t had sex. And when he thought about getting an annulment and not having had the opportunity to make love to her, it all seemed wrong. He looked over at her looking out the window and suddenly, he didn’t want to go through life referring to her as his “ex-wife.” Things suddenly seemed clear.

“What do you mean?” she asked quietly.

“I mean I don’t think what we did was stupid.” he said softly.

“You don’t?” she asked hopefully. She tried to keep the rising excitement from her voice. He shook his head at her and she found herself smiling. “You’re telling me that you want to stay married to me?” He nodded and she smiled wider, but her smile fell quickly.

“What’s the matter?” he asked quickly. His heart was racing. What if she didn’t really feel the same way?

“There’s just so much we haven’t talked about.” Donna said. “We rushed right into it that we don’t even know if we want the same things.”

“We want each other.” He pointed out.

“Well, I sort of saw myself as a mother one day, Josh.” Donna replied. “Kids are a big deal in a marriage.”

“When’s one day?”

“I don’t know.” she shrugged. “But I eventually want kids.”

“Me too.” he nodded.

“Yeah?”

“Eventually.” he said quickly. “What we’re going to be doing right now is really important to me. It’s kind of got to take front and center for a while.”

“How long’s a while?” she asked. She couldn’t believe they were getting into this conversation.

“Couple of years.” He replied. “Maybe the first term.”

She shrugged and nodded. She supposed she could live with that.

“I was thinking about going back to school.” she continued hesitantly. “I was going to look into Georgetown and see what they offered at night and on the weekends.”

“Okay.” he nodded.

“Really?” she smiled.

“Yeah.” he laughed.

He was amazing, she thought. He was actually encouraging her to do something for herself?

“You could start in the fall.” he said. “That’ll give you plenty of time to transfer your credits, register and for us to figure out a schedule for work.”

“A schedule for work?” she frowned.

“Sure.” he nodded. “If you’re going to be consistently out of the office at night, we’re going to need to, like, prepare for that. Of course, there will be nights that I do need you there that you might have to skip class, state dinners or something. But I’ll talk to your professors. I’m sure they won’t have a problem with it.”

“I don’t understand.” she said shaking her head.

“What don’t you understand?”

“CJ said we couldn’t work together if we stayed married.”

“CJ’s not the boss.” Josh reminded. “I outrank her, at the moment, and when we’re in the White House. We’re too good a team for me to lose you now. I’d be a nightmare.”

“Well, that’s true.” Donna agreed. “But, Josh...”

“I’ll figure it out.” he said.

“How?”

“I will.” he assured. “I’m a Fullbright Scholar. I can certainly figure out a plan to keep you working for me. I’m not losing you now. I mean, after you graduate is one thing, but until that time comes...” he trailed off and saw her looking at him smiling through her tears. Without thinking anymore, she threw her arms around his neck and hugged him tightly. He was, after all, her husband. Didn’t that mean that she could do this sort of thing whenever she wanted now?

He held her tightly and inhaled her scent. He loved the way she smelled. She always smelled fresh and fruity. He didn’t know if it was her shampoo, or some kind of lotion, but he was looking forward to finding out.

They pulled away and looked at each other. Josh brushed the hair back out of her face and smiled. Soon, the urge to kiss her was too great to deny, and he wasn’t surprised that she met him halfway. She still tasted sweet to him. It must be the taste of Donna, he thought, and opted not to stop himself from smiling against her lips.

He couldn’t pinpoint exactly when he had fallen in love with her, but she had cast some kind of spell over him all the same. She was always happy to see him; always eager to learn something from him; always anticipating his needs. She truly enjoyed his company. They had spent endless nights up late talking on the campaign bus, plane, in hundreds of hotels. There was nobody on the campaign trail that knew him as well as she did, not even Sam or Leo. He told things to her that he didn’t tell anyone else.

“Donna,” he said pulling back from the kiss. He smiled when she pouted. “I can’t wait to get you alone.”

She studied him for a second. “Are you saying you want to join the mile high club?”

His eyes widened in surprise. “No!” he said quickly. “Well, yeah sure, I mean, who doesn’t, but not today. I was talking, like, figuratively.”

“Good.” she smiled. “Because while I’m certainly not adverse to the idea, I don’t want our first time to be in an airplane bathroom.”

“Me either.” he smiled, kissing her lightly again. “You know, we’ll be able to join the mile high club on Air Force One.”

“Do you really think I’m going to be able to work for you?” she asked hopefully.

“I’ll figure it out, I promise.” he nodded.

“I’ll get to ride on Air Force One?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t you?”

“I don’t know.” she shrugged. “I guess I just never thought you’d bring your assistant to...why would we have to go on Air Force One?”

“Fundraisers, speeches, campaigning.” Josh ticked off. “Tons of reasons.”

“Overseas?” Donna asked hopefully.

“Well, I’m not sure I’ll be allowed to take you on overseas trips, but you better believe I’ll be fighting pretty hard to.” he assured.

She smiled brightly at him. She couldn’t believe the stuff they were talking about. The White House, state dinners, Air Force One. She’d never really allowed herself to imagine what would happen after the election; win or lose. And she certainly never expected THIS turn of events. She lost her smile again and studied him carefully.

“What’s your mother going to say about us?” she asked.

“She likes you.”

“But what’s she going to say?”

“I have no idea.” he confessed. He truly didn’t. His mother had been harping on him for years to settle down and get married, but his last serious girlfriend was Mandy and Mandy wasn’t the marrying type. “Why? What are your parents going to say?”

“They’ll be pissed.” she assured. “But they’ll get over it. They like you, too.”

“How pissed?”

“They’ll think I was being impulsive; they’ll probably think it’s Peter all over again.”

“But it’s not.” he said quickly.

“I know. They’ll figure it out.” she nodded.

“I just really want that to be clear, Donna. I don’t expect that from you at all.” he continued. “I mean, I’m not sure what I expect, but I know I don’t expect that.”

“I know.” She smiled bringing her hand up to his face and gently stroking his cheek with her thumb. She stifled a yawn and rested her head on his shoulder. When she couldn’t get comfortable, she raised the arm rest and snuggled down into his side. He brought his arm around her and she linked her fingers with his other hand. He kissed her forehead and she drifted off to sleep.

Rubbing her shoulder, he started to try to formulate a plan. He wanted her with him at the White House. Since the day she hired herself, he ceased to imagine it without her there. He needed to figure out a way to keep her on. But CJ was sure to throw a monkey wrench into those plans. If Leo knew they were married, he wouldn’t let them work together.

Which meant they had to keep it a secret.

He wasn’t sure what he thought about that. He wasn’t sure how long they could keep up a ruse like that. She would obviously be living with him. He wasn’t about to have his wife in another apartment like some kind of shacked up kept woman. First of all, she didn’t have a place in DC. She had a PO Box that she set up the last time they were there so she’d have some place to get mail besides her parents’, but she hadn’t looked for an apartment yet, and now she didn’t need to. So he needed a way for them to live together and get it past human resources. He also needed to figure out if he could get it past their friends. Would CJ, Sam, and Toby find it strange that they never came to his place? Would they even notice?

More importantly, how was Donna going to feel about the clandestine part? He wasn’t planning on lying on his taxes or anything like that. But if she could never have people over, or kiss him in public or dance close with him at official functions...suddenly, this was all not sounding so great. What kind of marriage would it be if he had to hide his wife; had to hide his feelings for her?

Of course, she could not work for him and then it wouldn’t matter. But he REALLY liked having her around him during the day. She kept him grounded. She reeled him in when he was going off the deep end. He imagined that was going to happen a lot once they were in the White House. He smiled as he thought that she made him a nicer person. She calmed him down when no one else could.

She stirred against him and squeezed his hand. He HAD to figure out a way to keep her at work. He just couldn’t work 14 hour days, sometimes even longer, without her there with him. If she worked somewhere else, they’d never see each other. She had to be with him; she had to see what he was doing all day; she had to be a part of it.


	3. Secret, The

“This is your place?” she asked looking around as they lugged their suitcases into the apartment behind them.

“Our place.” he corrected. She looked over at him and smiled.

“It’s nice.” she said. “It’s big. I’ve married well.”

“You didn’t do too shabby.” He smiled back. “Of course, my salary is about to go down a bit since I’ll be on the government payroll.”

“I didn’t marry you for the money.” she laughed. He loved the way her laugh filled his empty apartment. They been through the door for three minutes, and already it felt like home with her. 

“You married me in a drunken stupor.” he countered.

“But that’s not why I’m staying married to you.” she said softly.

“It occurs to me,” he began walking slowly toward her “that a man usually gets his bride some kind of wedding present.”

“Really?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Like what?”

“Well, I suppose you could start with redecorating.” he said looking around the living room and back to her.

“Really?” she asked again.

“If you’re going to live here, Donna, don’t you think you should feel at home?” he replied. She was standing right in front of her now and she couldn’t resist the urge to hug him again.

“I already do feel at home.” she whispered. They pulled back to look at each other, and suddenly, she felt very nervous. She shouldn’t feel nervous because this was Josh, and they were married, which she still thought was totally wild, and she certainly wasn’t a virgin, but she was still nervous. He pushed the hair away from her face and smiled.

“What can I do?” he asked softly.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re nervous.” he replied and her eyes widened at how well he could read her. “What can I do to make that go away?” She shook her head quickly. She was mortified that he saw that. She wasn’t 16; this wasn’t her first time. This was the man she promised to love, honor, and cherish. “Would you feel better if I told you I loved you?”

She smiled widely and his chest tightened. He really did live to make her smile.

“Would it be true?” she countered.

“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it.” he said. He was serious now, and she wasn’t sure what to do with that. She knew he was friendly with a lot of people, but nobody got this close to him. Nobody got to the place where they could see him vulnerable, where they could see his weaknesses. That’s what made him so amazing at his job. She’d learned that early on.

Yet, he let her there. He let her to that place that was so deep down and so rarely seen.

She smiled again and the nervousness was gone. “I love you, too.” she whispered.

She laughed a little when he looked surprised. “No one’s ever said that to you before?”

“They did.” he nodded. “I just don’t think they meant it.”

“Well, I do.” she whispered.

“It’s okay if it doesn’t happen right now.” He said quietly. “It’s okay if we wait.”

“I don’t want to wait.” she said softly shrugging out of her coat and draping it on the couch.

“Me either.” he said smiling.

 

“Hi Mom!” Donna greeted nervously into the phone.

“Good morning, Donnatella.” her mom replied. “You sound better than the last time I talked to you a few days ago.”

“The President-Elect just won the election, mom.” Donna reminded. “I was a little drunk.”

“Your father and I figured, dear.” Donna could hear her mom smiling on the other end of the phone, and started to lose her nerve. Luckily, Josh wasn’t home right now. She had bundled up all their dry cleaning, and he had taken it down to the cleaners, promising to also stop on his way back to buy food, since there was absolutely none in the house.

“Are you still in New Hampshire?” her mother asked.

“No, mom. Josh and I flew to Washington yesterday.”

“How is Josh?”

“He’s really good, mom.” Donna smiled glad her mother asked about him.

“Are you going apartment hunting today?” her mother asked.

“No. I don’t really need to do that.” Donna said biting her lower lip.

“You found a place already?”

“You could say that.”

“Donnatella, what’s going on?”

Donna took a deep breath before lowering her the boom. “Josh and I did something a little impulsive, mom.” Donna began.

“Oh, Donna.” her mother sighed. “What did you do now?”

“We got married Tuesday night.” Donna blurted.

There was a momentary silence on the other end as her mother absorbed the shock of the information Donna just gave her.

“To each other, dear?”

“Yes.”

“Donna, are you ...”

“I love him, mom.” Donna said quickly.

“That’s not what I was asking, honey.” her mother said.

“You’re asking me if I’m pregnant!” Donna shrieked.

“It’s sort of a logical question from this end, honey.” Lynn said. “It’s not like you two were together.”

“I’m NOT pregnant.” Donna insisted.

Donna heard her mother sigh and instantly, she felt like she was 20 again, telling her parents she was dropping out of college to support Paul.

“Honey, Josh is a really good person.” Her mother began. “He’s smart, well established in his career, he gave you a direction when you were drifting, the things he does changes a entire country.”

“What are you getting at mom?” Donna demanded.

“I’m wondering if you don’t maybe have a little case of hero worship.” her mother suggested hesitantly.

“No, mother.” Donna insisted. “I love him, and he loves me. Want to know how I know that?”

“He told you?”

“That, and I’m going back to school in the fall.” Donna replied. “When I brought it up, he was all over it.”

“Full time?” her mother asked surprised.

“No, nights and weekends.” Donna replied. “I’m going to see if Georgetown will accept my credits from UW.”

“And you’re going to work during the day?”

“Of course.”

“Where?”

“Well, right now I work for the transition team with Josh.” Donna reminded. “Then I’ll work with Josh when we move to the White House.”

“And you think that’s a good idea?” Lynn countered.

“Yes.”

“Who’s idea was that?”

“Josh’s.”

“Honey, Josh isn’t ALWAYS brilliant.” Lynn said.

“Yes, he is, mom.” Donna said.

“You don’t think that’s going to be awfully tough?” Lynn asked.

“It might be.” Donna shrugged. “We work really well together, mom.”

“I know you do, sweetie. But you weren’t married before. How are you going to separate your marriage from the office?”

“We’ll figure out a way.” Donna said confidently.

Donna heard her mother sigh again and Donna knew she was disappointed. She knew it wasn’t that her mother didn’t like Josh, it was the whole package. Donna didn’t quite know how to explain it to her parents either. They would just have to see with time.

 

“Good morning, mom.” Josh greeted his mother over his cell phone.

“Is this my son?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Because it vaguely sounds like my son, but my son doesn’t call me in the morning in the middle of a work week. He usually calls me as an after thought at some un-Godly hour, like midnight.”

“I can call back later.” Josh suggested not rising to the bait of her guilt trip.

“Oh no, honey. I’m always all ears for you.”

“I will not disappoint you this time.”

“Oh God, what’s wrong?”

“Wrong?” Josh asked. “Nothing’s wrong.”

“How’s Donna?”

“She’s...why would you ask about Donna?” Josh asked instantly on alert.

“She’s a wonderful girl; you two seem very close; she’s your assistant. Why shouldn’t I ask about her? She’s certainly almost all you talk about when you call.” 

Josh smiled as he listened to his mother. She was baiting him. She’d been baiting him about Donna since she first met her. THIS was going to be quite fun for him.

“Well, I’m going to talk about her this time, too.” he smiled.

“Really?” Sara Lyman said perking up. “And what are we going to talk about?”

“The fact that she and I got married the other night.” Josh blurted, smiling at the silence the announcement invoked.

“Joshua, do not fool an old woman.”

“I’m absolutely not.” Josh assured. “She’s back at my place, well, our place, right now talking to her parents and probably rearranging my entire life.”

“What am I supposed to do with that information?” Sara demanded.

“Know it.” Josh shrugged.

“You’re telling me I have a daughter in law?”

“Yes.”

“Do I have a grandchild on the way?”

“No. Maybe in a couple of years.” Josh said. “We’re going to starting work in the White House in a few months. That’s going to take some getting used to.”

“So you’ve talked about kids then?”

“Yes.” Josh said now incredibly relieved Donna had already brought the subject up.

“I can’t believe there’s a voice of reason somewhere down there.”

“Are you mad?”

“I don’t know what I am truthfully.” Sara admitted. “I mean, I’ve wanted you to find someone that makes you happy and settle down. I just thought, I’d, you know, get to dance with you at your wedding.”

“I know, mom.” Josh said quietly. “I’m sorry about that.”

“She makes you happy?”

“Blissfully.”

“Blissfully? That was too much information, Joshua.”

“You should come down.” Josh said impulsively.

“I’m sorry?”

“You should come visit.” he suggested again. “I’m never going to get time off between now and inauguration day to bring her up there. You should come down.”

“I’ll consider it; I have a life.” his mother reminded.

“I’m your only son.”

“Well, this is true.” she sighed dramatically.

“Call me when you pick a weekend.” Josh smiled disconnecting the call.


	4. Secret, The

“CJ keeps looking at me weird.” Donna said quietly to Josh in his office at the transitions office.

“No, she’s not.” Josh assured.

“She really is.” Donna said looking nervously out the door, as if she could see CJ through the walls.

“Close the door.” he directed nodding towards the door. She walked over and pushed it shut and returned to his side. She was a little surprised when hooked his finger under her chin and kissed her deeply. She certainly wasn’t expecting that. These moments were EXTREMELY rare in the office. If they wanted to work together, they had to prove that they could be strictly professional.

“You think she’s looking at you weird because of that?” he smirked pulling away.

“Hmm?”

He laughed softly when he took in her smiling face and he couldn’t resist the urge to kiss her again.

“You’re going to get us busted if you keep doing things like that.” she chided softly.

“No, I’m not. The door’s closed.” he promised.

“Who are these interviews on your schedule for today?” she asked looking down at the piece of paper she was holding.

“For my assistant position.” he replied hesitantly.

“Assistant what?”

“Senior Assistant to the Deputy Chief of Staff for Strategic Planning.”

“You’re the Deputy --” She began, but as it dawned on her, her eyes grew wide. “You’re interviewing for MY job!?”

“I have to.” he said quickly. “I’m going to put your name on there for the afternoon.”

“You’re actually going to interview me for my own job?”

“No. But I have to make it look like I did.” he countered.

“I don’t understand what’s going on here.” she said.

“I’m going to interview several people, weedle it down to a select few I think I might be able to work with, including you, then hand everyone off to Leo for his final say so.”

“You don’t hire your own assistant?”

“Well, I do. But in this case, I want Leo to do it.” Josh replied.

“Why?”

“Because he’ll pick you, and when it eventually comes out that we’re married, he’ll be the one that hired you and not me.”

Donna was in awe at the amount of thought he was putting into this. “So I have to interview with Leo?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to do that.” she said quickly.

“Why?”

“He scares me.”

“He’s just loud.”

“So are you, but you never scared me.”

“I should hope not.”

“Are you going to be in the interview with me?”

“Noooo.” Josh replied. “When you meet with him, I’m not even going to be in the building.”

“Josh!”

“Calm down. He’s going to hire you. You’re already working for me.” he assured.

“What if he doesn’t?”

“He will.”

“What if he doesn’t?”

“If he doesn’t hire you for me, he’ll probably hire you for communications, and then we can, like, openly be together. But he’s going to hire you for me.” Josh assured.

Donna looked at him skeptically. She wasn’t a fan of this. Josh was making Leo an unknown participant of this. When this exploded, it was going to be enormous.

“Stop looking at me like that.” he said. “I swear, it’s going to be fine.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Josh!” Leo barked from his office as he saw his deputy walk by his office. Josh poked his head in his office in answer. “Why the hell am I hiring your assistant?” Leo was thumbing through four folders of resumes.

“Because I want you to.” Josh replied.

“Why?”

“Because I do.”

“Josh, just hire Donna.” Leo directed. “Isn’t that who you want?”

“Yes. But I want you to pick who think is most qualified.”

“Josh, some of these people have masters degrees.” Leo noted.

“Well, Donna’s going to go back to school for political science.”

“Josh, just hire her. She may not have the degree, but she’s the only one you never managed to scare off and she can actually control you.”

“Okay. So sign off on her then.” Josh said.

“Josh, I have 1300 people to staff. YOU’RE supposed to be helping me by handling this level.”

“I am.” Josh nodded. “I’ve been interviewing and hiring deputies on down. It’s just this particular position.”

“Fine.” Leo grumbled. “I’ll interview these four. I don’t know why, since I’m going to just pick Donna anyway, but I’ll do it because, you know, I don’t have a whole cabinet to staff or anything.”


	5. Secret, The

“Oh Donna! Thank God!”

Donna turned around at the sound of Kathy’s voice. Sam’s assistant came rushing over to her carrying a small baby in one hand and a folder in another. Donna stood there momentarily stunned in the middle of the transition offices.

“I have to bring this to Sam. It’s the changes to the inaugural. I did them at home last night and she’s got a doctor’s appointment today.” Kathy explained quickly.

“I’ll give them to him.” Donna smiled holding out her hand.

“No, there’s something I need to point out to him. If he sees it on his own, he’s going to freak.” Kathy said. “Can you just hold Sadie for a few minutes while I run into his office?”

“Oh, Kathy...” Donna began unsure.

“It’s just a few minutes.” Kathy said handing her daughter off and letting a diaper bag fall off her shoulder. “She shouldn’t give you any trouble.”

Donna held the little girl under both her arms and a little out in front of her.

“Thanks Donna, you’re a lifesaver.” Kathy said and rushed by her.

Donna was still regarding the little girl closely when Josh wandered by. When she noticed him he was arching a brow at her, clearly interested as to what was going on her.

“This is Kathy’s daughter.” Donna said smiling to the little baby. She really was cute.

“I didn’t know Kathy was married.” Josh replied.

“Yeah. So’s Bonnie.” Donna nodded.

“Who’s Bonnie?”

“Bonnie is going to be shared by both CJ and Toby. She’s sort of a floater.” Donna explained.

“I thought CJ had Carol and Toby had Ginger.” Josh frowned.

“They do. Bonnie’s picking up the slack.”

“Who’s picking up my slack?” he asked.

“You don’t have any.” she said looking pointedly at him. Well, that was true, he thought. So far, Donna was handling everything he gave her on her own, not that he thought she wouldn’t.

Josh watched as Donna held the baby closer, smiling and cooing to her. He had to admit that she looked good with a baby in her arms, but they’d talked about this and agreed that it wasn’t in the cards at the moment.

“She’s so cute.” Donna smiled.

“Yeah.”

“She’s smiling, too. Look. Do you see?”

It was hard not to be affected by Donna’s happiness at the moment, but...well, it wasn’t what they talked about.

“You seem pretty smitten.” he noted carefully.

“I don’t know.” she smiled. “It wouldn’t be so bad, would it?”

This was what he was afraid of. Her changing her mind about things they decided already. He would be the worst father on the planet right now. They were hardly home as it was. She thought that was instantly going to change if they had a baby?

“Donna,” he said a little more softly. It was a Saturday and not many people were around, but he still didn’t want to risk getting overheard. “You have like, what, another ten years before the biological clock starts going off?”

“I think it’s already going off.”

“Find the snooze button.”

She looked up at him like she was just punched in the gut. That had come out like an order and he hadn’t intended it that way, but the words were already out, and they had done their damage. She looked away from him and nodded. She knew what she said wasn’t fair, but his reaction was a little more harsh than she’d expected, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw him walk away towards his office and slam the door.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donna stifled another yawn and looked over at the clock. It was 10 o’clock at night. Josh, Sam, CJ and Toby were still in the conference room. From the sounds of the raised voices, they weren’t letting up any time soon. Josh had been home very late every night for the past two weeks. When she got up in the morning, he was already gone. How he was existing on this little sleep was beyond her. She literally only saw him in the office. She tried to stay as late as he did, but she was finding it more and more difficult. He was operating on something completely different than her, some high octane fuel and she couldn’t keep up.

It had been two weeks since he touched her, two weeks since he said something non-work related to her. This is what it was going to be like in the White House? How did anybody exist this way? How was anyone supposed to have a social life outside of work? Painfully long hours at work, just so you could see your husband, and not even be able to act like a married couple?

CJ came flying by her desk but stopped abruptly when she saw her sitting there.  
“You’re still here?” she asked incredulously.

“Josh is still here.” Donna yawned.

CJ eyed her skeptically for a moment before returning to the conference room. Donna could make out some raised voices again, then Josh appeared at her desk.

“Donna, you look like you’re going to fall over, go home.” Josh’s soft voice seemed to permeate through her hazy mind and she looked up at him and smiled.

“You’re still here.”

“I’ll be here a while longer.”

“Then I want to be here, too.” She was practically whining; she didn’t care. She didn’t feel like he was her husband anymore, she felt like he was her roommate. And not even a roommate with benefits either because they hadn’t made love in two weeks either.

Nothing was going the way she thought it would.

“Donna, we’re not done yet. I don’t need you here now, you can go home.”

He didn’t need her? Maybe if she were more rested, she would have heard the entire meaning there and exactly what he said, but the only thing blaring out at her with shocking and devastating force were the words “I don’t need you.”

He, on the other hand, had no idea he was so staggeringly misreading her right now. She looked exhausted. She wasn’t used to long days like this. It wouldn’t be quite this intense in the White House, but they’d have their share of late nights. He was just as tired as she was, and he longed to touch her. By the time he got home at night, he was lucky he had the energy to get undressed.

He watched her nod her head, grab her purse and jacket and leave the office. He sighed and went back into the conference room.

“You two all right?” CJ asked him when he returned, her hidden meaning not lost on him.

“Why wouldn’t we be?” Josh shot back.

“You seem a little...off.” Sam jumped in.

“Off?” Josh asked raising his eyebrows.

“Yeah. You guys usually work so well together, and now you just seem be working around each other.” Sam replied.

“I changed my mind.” Toby piped up. “You’re not writing a major address to the nation.”

Sam rolled his eyes and looked at Josh again. “Has she been hired for the White House yet?”

“Not yet.” Josh sighed sitting back down.

“Maybe she’s getting nervous about that.” Sam suggested.

“That’s not it.” Josh denied. He had a plan about that. She hated it, but she was going along with it anyway.

“She might need some --” CJ began, but Josh had lost his tolerance of the subject matter already.

“She needs sleep, CJ.” Josh barked back. “She’s tired. All your assistants are gone. She doesn’t like to do that. She’s tired.”

Or so he thought.

When he finally returned home and collapsed into the bed, he rolled over, intent on pulling her towards him and feeling her warm, soft body against his, but he only grabbed a fistful of sheets. What the hell? He thought sitting up. He turned the bedroom light on. He was alone in the bed. He jumped out of bed and walked to the living room. Was she asleep on the couch and he missed it? No. The couch was empty. He next moved to the office. She wasn’t there either.

Panic began to set in as he checked the kitchen and shower, even the hall closet. But Donna was quite obviously not in the apartment. Now that he looked, her tote bag and coat weren’t here either. He grabbed his cell phone and frantically dialed her number, wondering if she’d been home at all.

Donna took a shaky breath when she saw his number flash across her caller i.d. He had obviously gotten home and found her gone. Was he really at the office THIS long? He’d never be able to make it keeping hours like this. She was tempted not to answer it, but that wasn’t fair. Well, what she had done wasn’t fair.

“Hello.” she greeted after a shaky breath.

“Are you all right?” he demanded. She smiled at the worry in his voice. She shouldn’t be happy that she had obviously worried him, but she was.

“I’m fine.”

“Where the hell are you?” he interrogated next.

“I just landed.” she confessed.

There was a momentary silence on the other end. “Landed?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“Landed is a term people use when they’ve been on an airplane.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you saying you’ve been on an airplane?”

“Yeah.”

“Can you stop using one word and fucking elaborate here, Donnatella?” he snapped. Oh God, now he was mad. Well, she wished he wasn’t swearing at her, but she couldn’t really blame him.

“I’m home.” she said.

“No, I’M home.” he countered. “Where the hell are you?”

“The Madison airport.” she said softly.

The silence was nearly deafening. He clearly hadn’t been expecting this.

“Did something happen?” He asked quietly.

“No.”

“Then why are you there?”

“Josh...”

“Why are you there, Donna?” he asked more forcefully.

“You can’t do this now.” she cried into the phone, dropping into a chair at a deserted gate. “You can’t be a husband.”

“It’s been two months, Donna, you haven’t really given me much of a chance here.” he pointed out, his voice rising again.

“I’m sorry.” she said through a sob.

“You’re right, Donna.” he said after a moment. “I can’t do this now.”

She dropped her head into her hand and listened to the silence on his end of the line. He had hung up. It was over and she was heartbroken. Why did she always do this? Why did she always let herself get so close to a man and set herself up for heartbreak? She didn’t know how to love any other way though. She didn’t know how not to love with him with everything she had. She certainly didn’t know what he expected of her. She had come to the painful conclusion this evening that he didn’t really want a wife and it tore through her like a bullet. He didn’t really understand what having a wife meant. How could he, when she didn’t understand what being a wife meant? When she calmed down, she picked up her suitcase and dragged it along behind her towards the exit. It was time to tell her parents she failed again.


	6. Secret, The

Donna sat on the front porch of her parents’ condo in the early morning and smiled when she saw her father come outside carrying two large mugs of coffee. She was in her pajamas and wrapped in a thick blanket. She knew it was cold by the way her father was bundled up, but she didn’t really feel it. He sat down next to her and began to push the swing slowly back and forth.

“You’re an early riser these days.” he noted.

“I didn’t actually sleep last night.” she confessed softly.

“No, I know.” he replied. “Your mother paced the bedroom most of the night listening to you cry.”

“I’m sorry, Daddy.” she said softly.

“It’s all right.” he nodded. “These are the way things are when you have kids. One day, you’ll know, too.”

“One day.” she said softly.

“What are you doing here, baby girl?” her father asked.

“It’s not going to work, Daddy.” she said looking down into her mug.

“You gave it two months, Donnatella.”

“I didn’t need to give it anymore. It was pretty obvious pretty quickly.”

“You can’t keep doing this, honey.” Her father said gently. “You’re 24 years old, and you’re married. You can’t keep running home like this when something doesn’t go your way.”

“I’m not what he wants, Daddy.” she said it so softly her father almost didn’t hear it.

“I’m not so sure about that.” he replied nudging her shoulder. He stood up and gestured out to the driveway where a cab was pulling in. Donna’s eyes widened and her jaw dropped as she watched Josh get out of the cab and run up the front walk. Her father disappeared inside and she stood up on the porch, rooted to her spot.

When Josh got to the top of the stairs, he stopped and looked at her. She looked like she had the same night he did. He walked to her slowly, grabbed her and hugged her. “Don’t do this.” he begged softly.

“Josh...” she began holding him tightly in return.

“Don’t do it.” he pleaded again. “It’s miscommunication and that’s it. And it’s my fault entirely.”

“I’m sorry.” she cried. “I just...I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know what you want from me. I don’t know how to be your wife AND your assistant and not to blur the lines. And you’re just so busy now, and I’m only in your way.”

“You are absolutely NOT in the way.” he insisted. “I am busy now.” he agreed. “Inauguration day, Donna, we have to hit the ground running as soon as we walk through the door or we’re screwed. If we falter even the slightest bit, it’ll torpedo everything we want to do in the first 100 days. And so yes, I am busy now. But it’s not going to be like this forever.”

“I really miss you.” she said quietly. He tried to be strong, but in the face of her tears, he fell apart. When had she gotten under his skin like this? When did she become so damn important to him. When she told him last night she was in Wisconsin, his heart stopped. He didn’t even think about it. He just went right to the airport and brought a ticket for the very next flight to Madison, then paced the gate for two hours before it boarded.

“I miss you, too.” he said quietly stroking her cheek.

“What do you want, Josh?” she asked.

“I want everything, Donna.” he answered. “When I get up in the morning, I want you there. When I’m at work, I want you there. When I go to sleep at night, I want you there. I want you in every aspect of my life. I want everything.”

“Gee, Josh, is that all?” she deadpanned.

“No. I want everything for the rest of my life.”

“That’s a tall order.”

“Can you handle it?”

“Are you challenging me?” she countered.

“Don’t I always?”

She couldn’t think the right words so she kissed him. It had been two long weeks, and she poured every lonely second into that one kiss. It had its desired effect on him. He grabbed onto her tightly, in an effort to keep standing up. She could say so much to him when she kissed him. It was never like that before. Though kissing Donna nearly always landed them in bed, Donna could also kiss to communicate, and it was an amazing feeling for him.

She pulled away and wiped the tears from her eyes and looked down toward his feet. “Where’s your suitcase?”

“I didn’t bring one.” he said.

“Why not?” she asked.

“We’re not staying.” he said softly. “I got on a plane to get you and go back to Washington. It’s Saturday. We have to be back at work on Monday.”

“You flew out here to...” she began.

“Yeah.” he smiled.

She threw her arms around his neck and laughed, hugging him tightly. No one had ever wanted her this much before. Certainly not Paul. But Josh had hung up the phone, gone to the airport with the intention of flying to Madison, getting her and flying right back. It was wildly romantic, and incredibly possessive at the same time. But it meant he loved her and he wanted to make it work.

The front door opened again and they turned to see Donna’s mother standing there. “Good morning, Joshua.” she greeted smiling.

“Good morning, Mrs. Moss.” he replied still gazing at Donna.

“Can I get you some coffee?” she offered.

“See that?” Josh said to Donna. “Your mom will get me coffee.”

“The apple fell far from the tree on that one, buddy.” she smirked.

“Thank you, ma’am.” Josh said to his mother-in-law.

“Don’t you ma’am me, young man.” Lynn Moss ordered opening the door and smacking him in the head while Donna led him inside. “I have a name, you’ll use it.”

“Yes, Lynn.” Josh smiled as she handed him a steaming mug of coffee.

“You two have some breakfast. And then Donnatella, you take your husband up to your room and put him to bed. He looks like death warmed over. I’ll call the airlines and find out when tonight’s flights are back to Washington.”

Donna pushed Josh down into a chair at the kitchen table. She moved to walk by him, but he pulled her down into his lap. He picked up her hand and kissed her fingertips. She ran her other hand through his hair and leaned her forehead against his.

Lynn Moss looked over the breakfast bar in the kitchen at her daughter and son-in-law and smiled. When Donna had called them and told them they’d gotten married, Lynn thought her daughter was being her usual impulsive self. When Donna had shown up on their doorstep late last night in tears, she had been sure of it. But here was Josh this morning. He’d come right after her. He was supposed to be building a new administration, but he came right away for Donna. The way he was looking at Donna now...well, Lynn suddenly felt like she wasn’t in the room.

Maybe they had moved a little fast, but this was so obviously right.

“I think I’m more tired than hungry.” he confessed softly to Donna.

“Yeah, me too.” she said running her fingers down his cheek. “I was up all night.”

“Me too.”

“Mom.” Donna said pulling herself out of his lap. “We’re going to skip breakfast now and go up to sleep.”

“Whatever you need, sweetie.” Lynn smiled watching as Donna took Josh gently by the hand and walked him upstairs.

 

As soon as they stepped through the bedroom door, Josh kicked it shut and wrapped his arms around her from behind. She sighed and fell back against his chest, snaking her hand up into his hair and dropping her head to the side so he could kiss her neck.

He turned her around and framed her face in his hands, piercing her with an intense gaze.

“You scared the hell out of me.” he said in a gravely voice.

“I’m sorry.”

“I thought...God, I thought so many things when you weren’t there.”

“I freaked out.” she confessed. “I’m so incredibly tired and when you said you didn’t need me --”

“Didn’t need you!? When the hell did I say that?”

“Last night at the office.”

“I said I didn’t need you there then because I was just arguing with CJ, Sam, and Toby and you didn’t need to stick around for that.” He said. “Trust me, Donna, I need you. I need you more than I’ve ever needed anyone in my life.”

“It’s just with these last few weeks being so busy, I just thought that now that you had this wife, you didn’t know what to do with her.”

“Trust me, Donnatella.” he said huskily backing her up towards the bed. “I know what to do with you.”

When she felt the back of her legs come in contact with the bed she grabbed onto his shirt and brought him with her when they tumbled back onto the bed. He continued to kiss down her neck, but stopped abruptly and lifted his head.

“What’s the matter?” she panted underneath him.

“This is the room you grew up in?” He asked smiling.

“Yeah. I’ll give you a tour later.” she said pulling him back to her.

He started kissing her again, but then pulled back. “Have you ever done this before in this bed?” He asked suspiciously.

“Sex with my husband in my parents house?” she countered. “No.”

“You know what I’m asking.”

“Do you really want me to answer that question now?” she asked.

He rolled to his side a bit and propped himself up on his elbow. “Yes.” he said matter of factly. “I do. This is a very virgin-like room. I want to know.”

“I have never had actual sex in this room before.”

“But you’ve done other things in this bed.” he concluded.

“Of course I have, Joshua.” she sighed. “I wasn’t exactly innocent when I met you.”

“Of course you were, don’t talk like that.” he replied.

She gave him a throaty laugh and pulled him back down to her. He felt so good above her like this that she thought she could just lose herself in him. She already had. When they were alone like this, sometimes she found it hard to see where she stopped and he began. One day, she’d be able to shout from the rooftops that she loved him, but now she could only whisper. She knew he liked to hear that the most, and sometimes, she’d just say it over and over again; whispering as she touched him.

She moved her fingers to gently stroke behind his ears, and he stopped kissing her, closing her eyes and resting his head on her shoulder, reveling in the way she could relax him. No woman had this kind of physical power over him before, and he often stunned that Donna, who was so young, possessed this talent.

“You know it’s possible I’m just THAT tired.” he whispered against her ear.

“Me too.” she laughed softly.

“I’m not kidding, Donna, I haven’t slept in well over 24 hours. I didn’t sleep at all on the plane.”

“I didn’t sleep last night either.” she assured. “I just laid here, crying and wondering how I was ever going to get used to sleeping without you.”

“I don’t ever want you to.”

“Me either.” she smiled.

He tried to stifle a yawn and she smiled, stroking his hair, as she watched him try to fight the sleep, pulling him close.

“Donnatella.” he said softly.

“Yes, Joshua.”

“If you leave me, I swear I’ll quite simply die of a broken heart.” he mumbled into her shoulder.

“Then I better stay with you forever then.”


	7. Secret, The

“All right! Let’s go!” Josh announced bouncing on the bed in their apartment the next morning.

“Are you serious?” she groaned pulling the pillow over her face.

“We have a lot to do today.”

“What are you even doing up?”

“I’m wired. I want to start the day.”

“No kidding.” she grumbled.

“I’ve got big plans for us today, Donnatella.” he announced.

“Do they include work?”

“Absolutely not.”

He saw her head peek out from underneath the pillow and smiled. “Really?”

“Really.”

“What are we doing?”

“Well, it occurs to me that before the election our trips here were really brief, and since we’ve been back, we’ve been really busy, and I’ve never given you a tour of Washington.”

“Really?”

“Yes.” he smiled. “I’m going to take you to all the monuments. We can’t get into the White House or the Capitol Building today because it’s Sunday, but I’ll get us in there eventually.”

She sat up still smiling. “You’re really going to give me a tour?”

“Not if you don’t get your lazy, but adorable ass out of bed.” he replied hopping off the bed and heading for the bedroom door. “And dress warm. It’s really cold.” Donna was out of bed and into the shower in record time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Josh and Donna walked along the Reflecting Pool on the chilly winter afternoon. She had bundled up, just as he requested. She was still freezing, but she’d be damned if she would call it quits. She wasn’t sure when they’d have another day like today and she wasn’t about to end it prematurely. He had his hands in his pockets, and she had her arms linked around his. Every now and then, they’d walk with her head on his shoulder, and he didn’t seem to mind, even though they were risking someone from work seeing them.

“It’s very inspiring down here.” she said as she glanced over their shoulder at the Washington Monument behind them.

“It really is.” he agreed.

“When’s the last time you did this?”

“Did what?”

“Came down here and looked at all this.”

“High school.”

“Shut up.” she laughed tapping his arm. “Seriously.”

“Seriously.” he replied. “I was always too busy and focused before to really come back and look at them. I’d already seen them, so I guess I figured that was enough.”

“Really?” she smiled.

“Really.” he nodded.

“Have you ever been inside the White House?”

“I’ve been on the tour.”

“But never in the West Wing?” she asked.

“Nope. That’ll be a first for both of us.”

“Can’t wait.”

“Now the Capitol Building, I’ve been all over.” he said nodding off in the distance behind them. “It’s way back there.“

“Over by the Smithsonians?”

“Yeah.”

“Can we do the Smithsonians, too?” she asked eagerly.

“We don’t really have any more time today, but we’ll get to them.” he promised sneaking a quick kiss on her temple, just below her hat.

“You’re being awfully bold.” she smiled at him. He shrugged as he looked back towards the Lincoln Memorial where they were headed.

“We have one more stop after the Lincoln Memorial.” he said. “Before I take you to my absolute favorite restaurant in Georgetown.”

“Out to dinner?” she smiled brightly and he nodded. “You’re being very good to me.”

“I don’t know how often we’re going to get to do this,” he said sadly. “So I want to take advantage of it now.” She smiled again and he dropped his gaze to the sidewalk.

What he didn’t say was that he didn’t know how often he could be seen at a romantic restaurant with “his assistant” after the inauguration before people started asking questions. After they took office, he was going to be a pretty visible person. So he wanted to savor moments like these with her. When they could be out in public and people, for the most part, didn’t give him a second glance, and she could hang on his arm like she was, and walk with her head on his shoulder like she was, and he didn’t have to be scanning the streets for someone with a camera.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Oh Josh.” she sighed when he led her out of the cab and stood on the sidewalk. “It’s adorable.”

“I didn’t built it, Donna.” he laughed.

“I know, but still.”

He opened the door for her and followed her inside. “1789 was named that for a few reasons: one, it’s the year the Constitution of the United States was adopted; two, it’s the year the village of Georgetown was incorporated. But I think what you’ll find most interesting is it’s also the year Georgetown University was founded.”

She smiled again at him as they were led to a cozy corner table near a fireplace. She pulled off her gloves and smiled when her ring caught the candlelight. His “last stop” was a jeweler where they picked out wedding bands. When Donna pointed out that they couldn’t wear them at work, Josh had asked the jeweler to look at gold chains so they could wear them around their necks at the office. Then he had to excuse themselves for a minute while he tried to console a sobbingly happy Donna.

“Is this one of your favorite date spots?”

“Nope. Though I confess to having brought my mom here a few times.”

“But it’s so romantic.” she sighed.

“Well, now I’m creeped out for having brought my mom here.”

“The inauguration is coming up.” Donna noted.

“Yup.”

“Are you excited?”

“Aren’t you?”

“I’m nervous.”

“Because of the White House?”

“That and everyone will figure out we’re lying.”

“We’re not lying.” he insisted.

“How are we not lying?”

“Nobody’s asked us.”

“It’s a lie by omission.”

“You notice how CJ hasn’t ever asked us whether or not we got the annulment?” he asked. At her nod, he continued. “It’s because she doesn’t want to know. Somewhere in her mind, she suspects that we didn’t do it. But if she doesn’t ask, she can’t say she knew for sure.”

“Well, she’ll be prefect for her job then.” Donna murmured. “Hey, don’t forget, I’m meeting Jeff tomorrow for lunch.”

“Jeff? Who the hell is Jeff?” he demanded.

“The guy who’s in my job now. He said he’d show me around.” she nodded to him.

“He’s republican, Donna.” Josh reminded.

“So? He said that he’d show me around. The guy before him did it for him and they were democrats.”

“Hazing the new administration in the White House is notorious, Donna.” he said.

“You think he’s going to try and trick me?”

“Yes.” Josh nodded.

“And you think I’m going to fall for it?”

“I certainly hope not.”


	8. Secret, The

Josh watched reluctantly as he saw Donna slip away after the Inaugural speech. She was heading right over to the White House to get them set up. He smiled as he remembered her telling him last night how she had muscled Ginger out of the office she claimed for him when Ginger was trying to get it for Toby. Next to Leo’s it was the closet one to the Oval Office, which, undoubtedly, is why Toby was interested in it in the first place. Josh was going to stay behind with the new President and the rest of the senior staff and eventually make it over with the motorcade, while Donna went ahead and made sure everything was ready.

He sighed heavily as he saw her disappear into the crowd. So began their life for the next four years.

Donna on the other hand was extremely excited as she pushed her way through the crowds to make her way to the White House. Somehow, she had strong armed Ginger into giving up the office she wanted for Josh. And though it couldn’t fit a couch like Josh wanted, she had other plans for it. She’d told him repeatedly that even if it COULD fit a couch, she wasn’t going to let him have one. If he had a couch in his office, he’d surely be inclined to sleep there from time to time.

She showed her i.d. to security at the lobby to the West Wing, put her box through the metal detector, and headed off towards the Operations Bullpen. She grinned as she took note of the people that hadn’t bothered to come here ahead of time and get the lay of the land. Josh had been one of those people. She was confident that as soon as he got there, he’d have her lead him wherever he needed to go. That was, if he found the bullpen on his own.

She dropped the box on her chair and surveyed her new cubicle. There wasn’t all that much room, but as Josh’s senior assistant, she had more room than the others in the bullpen, others who were, ironically enough, higher up in the pecking order. But since they weren’t higher up in Josh’s eyes, she got the bigger cubicle. She laid out the various books and pictures on her desk and familiarized herself with the immediate area surrounding her, including her proximity to the coffeemaker.

Once she was confident that she knew where things were, and she had moved her computer the way she wanted, she entered Josh’s office to see if it was setup the way she had requested. She was pleased to see that it was. She surveyed the enormous blackboard that took up an entire wall. She had poured over his job description for hours, in order to make sure that she set his office up the best way it could be. She thought that the blackboard would be helpful to him to keep track of upcoming votes and who was voting which way. He could see it all at a glance. She had also requisitioned four t.v.s for his office, so he could have CSPAN, CSPAN2, MSNBC and CNN on all at the same time.

One of the reasons she liked this office so much, in addition to its location to the Oval Office, which she was sure to get plenty of “thank you sex” for later, was because out the window, you could see the entrance to the West Wing, so she could watch for him, if she were so inclined.

It had three doors. One led to the bullpen and her desk, which she was all of 12 feet away from his office door; one led in from the West Wing lobby, which he thought she’d just lock and wait to see how long it took him to open it on his own and figure out how to sneak by her; and the third, unfortunately, connected his office to CJ’s. CJ wasn’t always going to have an office connecting to Josh, but there was something going on with hers and water damage, that she’d be in this one for a while. This made Donna extremely wary. There was no telling what CJ might overhear them saying or doing in his office.

When she returned to the bullpen and powered up her computer, she heard the commotion of staffers talking about how the motorcade had just arrived. Donna had tore off for the lobby to wait for him. He entered and signed in with the rest of the senior staff and he smiled when he saw her.

“You disappeared fast.” he noted. She gently tugged his sleeve in the direction she wanted him to walk. She took him right through the lobby door anyway. She wanted to convey to him how well she’d done. He stopped dead when he saw that it was an office.

“Where are we?” he asked.

“Your office.” she smiled. He looked around and took a moment to take in the setup. “Where’s the Oval?”

She smiled as she gently turned him around and pointed across the lobby to the bank of offices immediately across from them.

He turned back to her and gave her the widest grin she’d ever seen from him. “There’s much thank you sex in your future tonight.” he smiled and said quietly.

“I figured.” she replied. “Let me show you the rest.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Donna.” Josh said quietly appearing at the side of her desk.

“Yes?” she asked while not taking her eyes off her computer monitor.

“I don’t want to ask you to get me something to eat...” He began.

“But you’re going to anyway?”

“Well, I have no idea where the mess is.” he confessed. She smiled and stood up.

“I’ll show you.” she said. “You’re buying.”

“Like it makes a difference?” he mumbled as he fell into step next to her. “None of us could find West Wing 160 today.”

“It’s the Mural Room.” she said.

“Seriously?”

“Yeah.” she confirmed. “Once the bullpen is clear tonight, you and I will take our own tour.”

He smiled over at her, and Donna could tell that he was suppressing the urge to tell her he loved her, right there in the middle of the corridor.

“But for those eight balls we have to go to.” he smirked.

She stopped dead where she was walking and he watched her. This was about to become a thing.

“Josh!”

“Yes, Donna.”

“Eight balls!?” she shrieked.

“This isn’t a surprise.” he countered.

“It’s 5 o’clock!”

“Yes.” he nodded.

“I have to go home and get ready.” she said turning in the opposite direction.

“Still hungry over here, Donna.” Josh called after her. She spun around again, grabbed him by the arm and dragged him through the corridors towards the mess.

“Uh, Donna?” he squeaked.

“I don’t have time to dilly dally.” she announced. “I am now officially running behind.”

“You’re also officially losing your mind.” He pointed out. When she stopped and glared at him, he tried to backpedal. “And you’re obviously having a moment of lucidity right this very minute.”

She turned without a word and propelled him into the mess. “I’m going home.” she announced. She turned away, but his voice stopped her.

“Donna, if you leave me down here today, you might never see me again.”

She stopped and looked at him. He had a point. He was practically running into walls all day. In his defense, so were CJ, Sam, and Toby. It was rather amusing to watch.

“Hurry up.” she permitted gesturing to the near empty mess.

“You should eat, too.” he advised. “These aren’t things where there’s usually dinner, just a lot of drinking and some have fingerfood.”

“You saw my dress.” she said. “I cannot afford to eat the wrong thing and then get bloated.”

“You just said you were going to eat something.” he countered.

“Yeah, I changed my mind. It’s been a rough day, I can do that, right?”

After he put his order for his burger in, he moved over to her and dropped his voice.

“You okay?” he asked softly.

“Yes.” she snapped.

“Because everyone is a little overwhelmed today. It’s okay to be.”

“I didn’t want to be.” she admitted as tears formed in her eyes. “I did really good this morning.”

“You did really good all day.” he corrected.

“Will you just...”

“What?”

“Come home with me now?” she asked.

He smiled slowly at her. “Yeah. What do you want? We’ll get it go.”

He smiled when she, of course, ordered a salad. He wanted to hug her so badly now. He knew there would be times when they could get away with it, and probably later tonight, but right out of the gate, this wasn’t one of them. He couldn’t wait to dance with her tonight and give him an excuse to hold her in public. He did see her dress. It was black, and slinky, and all sorts of sexy. He had no idea how he was going to keep his hands off her tonight.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Who the hell was that guy?” Josh demanded as a breathless Donna found him by the bar at the last of the balls. Thankfully, he was alone, and she didn’t think anyone else heard this little bout of possessiveness.

“Oh, that’s Joe. He works in legislative affairs.” she smiled looking back to where she saw her retreating recent dance partner.

“How do you know him?”

“I don’t.” she replied taking a sip of the water he handed her. “I’m your assistant; everybody knows who I am.”

“Yeah, well, I’m moving that guy back up to New Hampshire.” Josh grumbled.

“Did I get all hot and bothered when you danced with ‘Wessingslut?’” Donna countered.

“You mean Sara Wessinger?” He asked smirking at the name she’d called his ex-girlfriend.

“Is that her name?” Donna asked innocently. “Mandy always used to call her Wessingslut.”

“You gave me stink eye the entire time.” Josh said looking over his drink at her. The conversation was dropped quickly though when Sam sidled up to them.

“You guys have been awfully anti-social with the rest of us tonight.” he noted ordering a drink.

“We haven’t been anti-social at all.” Donna defended. “I danced with Joe from leg affairs, who’s a perfectly nice guy by the way; and he danced with Sara Wessingslut.”

Sam arched a brow at Donna’s use of a name Mandy always used to use, but dropped it when the bartender handed him his drink.

“You and Sara were once quite the hot couple.” Sam said to Josh. Josh groaned inwardly as he watched Donna’s eyes widen. “Any sparks left?”

“No, Sam.” Josh croaked.

“I’m going to see if Joe wants another dance.” Donna announced. As she spun away from them, she felt a hand clamp around her wrist and knew without looking it was Josh.

“Time to dance with my stunning assistant.” he announced.

“You do look rather stunning tonight, Donna.” Sam nodded, missing Josh’s glare. He led her out to the dance floor and melted in with other couples crowding the floor. He pulled her as close as he possibly could without raising eyebrows, but didn’t stop his thumb from rubbing lightly on her back.

“WERE there sparks?” she asked him. She couldn’t help it. She tended to get just as possessive as he did sometimes.

“No. And knock it off.” he replied. “You’re going to draw more attention by freaking out. People are going to say stuff like that around us, you have to keep it together.”

“Do you really think I look nice?”

“You look beautiful.” he said softly. She smiled brightly and he couldn’t help but continue. “Of course your breasts are popping right out of this thing, and I’m not all that crazy about that. Well, I am, but I don’t want these other guys to see them. And now that I’m looking at that particular part of your anatomy, I can see that you can see right down your dress, so I will be your only dance partner for the evening.”

“Joshua!” she laughed rolling her eyes. She caught herself as she was about to lean in and put her head on his shoulder. It was just so natural for her to do that. They were already spending all their time with each other that evening. Donna had noticed more than a few long, curious looks from CJ. That was usually when she ended up accepting someone else as a dance partner.

“And you did really good today, I mean it.” he said softly. “Everyone was freaking out today; you kept your cool.”

“Thanks Abner.” she quipped.

“Well, you did have that little slip up, Bambi.” he laughed.

“As did you!” she retorted.

“Yes. I should know by now to take you on.”

“You really should; I take no prisoners.”

“You really don’t.” he smiled. He watched her eyes sparkle as they danced and he gave into the urge to pull her a little closer. Their distance from each other was still appropriate, but they were getting dangerously close to that line. “You tired?” he asked. She nodded and he turned and led her off the dance floor, discreetly slipping out the door.


	9. Secret, The

“Hey Bambi.” Josh called from the doors of the bullpen. Donna rolled her eyes at the greeting. “Bambi” and “Abner” had pretty much stuck at work for the time being and the other workers in the bullpen tended to be vastly amused when they heard them call each other that, mostly because Josh didn’t joke with anyone other than Donna, so when they heard her get in a dig at him, it was victory all around.

“Yes, Abner, what can I do for you?”

“Come in my office.” he directed, shaking an unmarked envelope at her. She cocked her head at him, but stood up and joined him in his office, closing the bullpen door behind her. She noted when she got into his office that he had already shut the other doors.

“What’s up?”

“I want you, if you would be so kind, to clear the first weekend of May for us. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.” he said.

“We have plans?” she asked perking up. He tossed her the envelope and curiously, she pulled out the contents. There were various brochures there and an email confirming reservations for a three night stay in Virginia Beach. He smiled as he watched her eyes pop out of her head and look up at him.

“I wish it were longer.” he said. “And I know it’s not someplace really exciting, but we didn’t take a honeymoon, and, well...I really want to get away with you.”

“Really?” she asked gleefully. When he nodded, she threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. “Somewhere where I can kiss you in public, and hold your hand when we’re out walking?”

“And I can openly be jealous when other men look at you.”

“Joshua, you do that anyway.” Donna replied. “You’re really not good at hiding that.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Shit. Well, I have no intention of trying harder in that department. Let a few rumors float with that.” he said waving hit off.

“For crying out loud, Josh. People are going to start feeling sorry for me if men stop hitting on me.”

“Strange as this seems, Donnatella, I’m pretty much okay with that.” he quipped. “Back to our mini-vacation.”

“Oh yes.” she cooed. “The beach.”

“Many shops, many restaurants, a Ghost walk at night.”

“The beach at night.”

“So you’ll make sure the weekend is clear.”

“Yup.”

“And you’ll put in vacation requests to HR.”

“Yup.”

“And you’ll bring me that cup of coffee?”

“Nice try, Abner.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, Donna.” CJ greeted swinging into her cubicle.

“Hi, CJ.” Donna smiled. “Josh is on the Hill, do you need something?”

“Well, I saw on the schedule that he’s taking a four-day weekend next month.”

“Yeah. He’s going to go see his mom.” Donna replied, sighing inwardly at adding another lie to the growing list.

“So that means you’ll be free that weekend to go out on the town?” CJ hedged.

“Actually, I was going to fly back to Wisconsin Wednesday night and spend some time with my family.” Donna replied.

CJ studied her for a second. “Okay. Well, maybe another night.”

“Just say the word.” Donna smiled.

“That’s a beautiful ring.” CJ complimented nodding in the area of Donna’s chest. Donna looked down and quelched the urge yelp in horror. Apparently, the sweater she was wearing that day was a little too low cut to hide her wedding ring and it was currently laying on the outside of her shirt. Instead of instantly hiding it away, she picked it up and fingered it gingerly.

“It’s a family heirloom.” Donna replied. “It was my grandmother’s. My sister has my grandfather’s.”

CJ continued to study her closely, and Donna tried to school her features into the picture of innocence. Deep down, Donna figured CJ must really know that they didn’t take care of the marriage. She must know that they’re still married and refuses to let the confession fully surface. Josh had told Donna many times if CJ doesn’t ask and confess to knowing, it gives her plausible deniability and it’s best for all involved. Donna didn’t really see how that was possible, but Josh told her that it’ll work out if something serious happens, CJ could help cover without letting the cat out of the bag.

Though Josh’s plan was well thought out, Donna had taken note that now that they were actually in the White House, the effort to hide their marriage was getting harder, and it was only bound to get worse. Sooner or later, it was bound to come out. Margaret had told her about the financial disclosures the staff had to do. When Donna had brought that up to Josh, he had reminded her that that was precisely why they had different bank accounts still. Sometimes she wished they would just come clean, but if they did, they were bound to get separated at this point. Once she saw the long days he had to work, she knew if she worked anywhere else, she’d never be able to see him, especially once she started classes in a few weeks.

She registered to start summer classes, rather than wait for fall classes. She was taking two night classes and one Saturday class. This worked out well for Josh because he could build his work load around working those three nights a week she’d be out of the office and Saturday, and nothing would look that suspicious. She had decided to double major, and Josh thought she was nuts, but she decided to major in political science and communications. She remember Mandy’s job during the campaign and she liked what she did. Josh remarked that in a thousand years, he’d never thought that his wife would follow in the footsteps of his ex-girlfriend, but he’d supported her choices all the same.

“Well, it certainly is a beautiful ring.” CJ complimented again, bringing Donna out of her thoughts.

“Thanks.” she said quietly dropping the ring safely back into her shirt.


	10. Secret, The

“Donna,” Carol said dropping down into a seat across from Josh and Donna on Air Force One. “Got a couple of spare minutes to talk?”

Donna looked over at Josh and he shrugged. He was immersed in reading, and she closed the lap top she had open in front of her and the paper for class that she was working on.

“Sure, Carol, what’s up?” Donna asked.

“Well, I know you’re busy with work and school and stuff,” Carol began. “But I’ve got this friend that I think would be a perfect match for you.”

Josh’s eyes instantly shot up from his briefing book and stared in horror at Carol. This was something he HADN’T planned for.

“Match for what?” Donna asked cocking her head to side and Josh had to smile at her naivete sometimes. She obviously hadn’t taken something like this into consideration either. Of course, she was married, and wouldn’t think of dating, but that didn’t mean someone else wouldn’t think of it.

“I think Carol wants to set you up on a date.” Josh smiled, hoping he was aptly hiding his paranoia.

“A date!?” Donna nearly shouted. “Oh Carol, this is a horrible time for me to start a relationship.” Seeing as how I have this husband here, she thought to herself.

“Well, he knows you work a lot.” Carol continued plowing ahead. “And he knows that you have school and stuff and probably won’t have much time. He’s not looking for anything serious.”

“Well, that’s even worse.” Josh snapped out, and both women looked curiously at him. “It means he wants someone to have sex with regularly, Donna, but no strings attached.”

“He’s really a nice guy, Josh.” Carol defended.

“Oh yeah? What’s he do?”

Donna couldn’t believe the turn this conversation had taken. Josh was grilling Carol on the acceptableness of a man she had no intention of going out with?

“He’s a middle school teacher.” Carol countered.

“Public school?”

“Yes.” She shot back, then turned the conversation back to Donna, since it didn’t really matter to Carol what Josh thought about a potential date for Donna. “Anyway, he’s involved in a lot of extra curricular activities with the kids, coaching and stuff, and so between all that, he doesn’t have a lot of time. So, I’ll have him call you.” Carol stood back up before Donna could protest and went back to her seat.

Donna looked over at Josh mortified, but he seemed to now be amused by what just took place.

“You’re finding this funny now?” she demanded heatedly. “Two seconds ago you were about to have the guy taken out.”

“It was bound to happen some time.” He laughed. “Go ahead and set up the date.”

“What!?” she asked, pressing her hand to his forehead. “Are you feeling okay?”

“It’s the perfect added cover.” he countered.

“I am NOT going out on a date with another man.” she said adamantly.

“You’re right. I’ll be dead and buried before I take the cover that far, but setting it up’s okay.”

“How am I going to set it up and then not go through with it?”

“I’m going to sabotage it.” he said simply.

“How?” she demanded.

“I don’t know.” he shrugged. “But I’ll do it in front of someone so they see. I’ll make you work late or something.”

“I don’t see how I make out in this deal.” Donna said skeptically.

“You make out by not having to commit adultery, how’s that?” He countered.

“Adultery is for sex.” she argued.

“No it’s not.”

“Oh, like you’d know.” she scoffed. “You’re not even a real lawyer.”

“I am actually, smart ass.” he replied. “Let’s stop talking about this. We have more pressing matters.”

“Like?”

“We can’t share a room in California.” he reminded. “We’ve been assigned separate rooms.”

“I have to sleep by myself?” she pouted.

“I have to sleep by myself, too.”

“Your brilliant plan is ending up with many unexpected flaws.” she said sitting back forcefully in her seat.

“Yeah. I didn’t think about stuff like this.” he admitted.

“We’re there for two nights.” she reminded with a bit of a whine.

“Trust me. I’m painfully aware.” he agreed. “But I’ll figure something out.”

“Yeah, good luck with that.” she huffed.

He went back to his reading and she turned to stare out the window out at the night sky. She smiled slightly at the memory from earlier in the day of when she and Josh first set foot on the plane. Air Force One was simply amazing. It was so much more than she had imagined. It certainly took them a little while to get accustomed to traveling in the lap of luxury. She drifted off to sleep and Josh barely noticed when her head hit his shoulder. She frequently fell asleep like this at night at home, when he was up late reading and she was staying up with him. He never stopped to remind himself where they were at the moment.

“Well, this certainly looks cozy.” Sam announced sitting down across from them in the seat Carol had earlier occupied.

Josh tensed for a moment, but there was really no other explanation here. “She’s tired.” Josh noted.

“I’m just wondering why she didn’t just, like, prop a pillow up against the wall or something.”

“I don’t think she was planning on falling asleep.” Josh replied.

“I don’t think Kathy would do that with me.”

“Do you want Kathy to do this with you?” Josh smirked.

“No!” Sam replied. “She’s married for crying out loud.”

“It doesn’t bother me, Sam.” Josh replied. Well, he thought, that much was certainly true.

“You two just always seem so much closer than the rest of us are with our assistants.” Sam noted.

“Are you implying something, Sam?” Josh asked.

“No. I’m just saying you guys seem to be good friends, too.”

“We are.” Thank God for small truths, Josh thought.

“It’s nice.”

“It is.”

“There’s a lot of trust between you two.”

“There is.”

“And a TON of sexual tension.”

“Excuse me?” Josh squeaked. This was of particular interest to him now. How in the hell could Donna give off any kind of sexual frustration whatsoever?

“Well, you guys are so flirty with each other, and you’re very tactile people.” Sam noted, and Josh groaned inwardly. Were they really that obvious? “And then there’s this.” Sam said gesturing to Donna currently sleeping on Josh’s shoulder. “It’s just nice to see you two take some kind of interest in each other outside the perimeters of work is all.”

“You don’t think it’s inappropriate?” Josh asked carefully.

“Well, it’s certainly not conventional.” Sam countered. “Still, I’ve known you a long time now, and...”

“And?” Josh prompted when Sam trailed off.

“Nothing.”

“No, what?” Josh prodded. “You’re right. You’ve known me a long time. I want to know what you think.”

“You’re different when you’re around her.” Sam said softly and Josh was surprised by the change in his tone.

“What do you mean?” Josh asked quickly. If something was standing out, he was going to need to make a few adjustments here.

“I don’t know.” Sam said with a shrug. “Ever since she joined the campaign, you seem more intent on focusing on the greater good. And when she’s around you’re always in a better mood. You’re good for each other; you’re compatible.”

“Good for each other?” Josh smiled arching a brow as his friend.

“Professionally!” Sam said quickly. “And non-professionally, I suppose.”

“Are you telling me I should ask her out?” Josh asked unable to believe he was having this conversation.

“Well, she’s your assistant.” Sam said.

“Yes, she is.”

“But you do work really well together.” Sam noted.

“Yes, we do.”

“I suppose it wouldn’t work as well though if you were together though.” Sam said with regret. “I mean, how do you separate yourselves. At work, you’d be the boss.”

“If that’s your current view on the situation.” Josh grumbled.

“Well, she does seem to be in charge.” Sam grinned.

“Yeah.”

“She probably would be at home, too.” Sam mused.

“You’re probably right.”

“This conversation is a bit surreal though.” Sam said. “I mean, when it comes down to it, she is your assistant.”

“Yeah.” Josh replied quietly.

“Still...”

“Still...”


	11. Secret, The

“And just what the hell is that?” Josh demanded as Donna emerged from the bathroom of their room at the Bed and Breakfast Josh booked at Virginia Beach.

“It’s my bathing suit.” Donna replied, turning and looking in the mirror.

“Where’s the rest of it?”

“What else are you expecting?’

“Sleeves! Pants! Something that covers your stomach, and you know, the rest of your ass!”

“It’s not a thong.” she countered.

“Thank God for small mercies!”

“It’s a pretty modest bikini, Joshua.”

“It’s really not, Donnatella.”

“This from the man with a fan club!”

“I didn’t form that fan club.”

“Hi Josh! We love you Josh!” she mimicked and Josh smirked. They had left late last night after a speech and it was Donna’s first encounter with his fans. He’d seen them before, but never really paid them much mind, other than a random smile or wave. Donna on the other hand was more than a little annoyed to discover their existence.

“Stop being snarky.” he directed. She moved to the bed to pull on her rather short shorts and a tank top over the bikini.

“See?” she said. “All covered up.”

“First of all, barely. Secondly, that’s only until we get to the beach.”

“Your possessiveness is only endearing to a fault, Joshua.”

“Mine!?” he challenged. “Listen to you and your jealousy over a bunch of college girls I don’t even know!”

She threw him an unamused look and twisted her hair up out of her face, exposing her neck and shoulders, then shoved one of her class textbooks in her totebag.

“Okay. You’re not even listening to me anymore. I think my opinion on the subject of how much skin you’re showing should be --“

The rest of his protest was cut off when she marched over to him, grabbed his face, and kissed him. Anything else he might have said died in his throat when he wrapped his arms around her kissed her back. Holding her against him, he pushed them down onto the bed.

“What about the beach?” she pouted playfully.

“We’ll get there later.” he said against her neck. “Besides, if you’re going to show this much skin, I’m going to leave hickies all over you.”

She giggled as his breath tickled her skin, and she didn’t care if he did. They went out to breakfast that morning and he held her hand, and kissed her across the table, and didn’t care who saw. She didn’t even care about his little caveman routine just before either. They were going to go to the beach, then they were going to go out to dinner, then she was going walk along with her head on his shoulders under the night sky and let everyone see them.

“Hey, Donna?” he asked pulling up to look at her.

“Yeah?”

“I’m not sure I tell you enough how much I love you.”

She smiled and reached up to run her fingers through his hair.

“I don’t think I tell you enough either.” she said softly.

“You tell me every single time you kiss me.”

“You tell me every time you pull your little Neanderthal routine.” she smiled pinching his side.

He yelped and grabbed her hand. Her breath caught as she saw his gaze become serious again. No one had ever looked at her the way he did. Every time he looked at her, his gaze burned right through to her soul. He was sweet, and tender, and funny, and demanding, and exciting all at once. The passion he gave her was nothing short of divine inspiration. When he loved, he loved deeply and almost recklessly.

It was such a fine line they were walking at work. Hiding their feelings from their friends and peers was sometimes draining. And suppressing those feelings made moments like this more spectacular with saved kisses stored away finally being allowed to surface. It made his touch upon her skin always explosive, always magnified to the highest level.

He, of course, knew he tended toward ridiculous when he complained about a revealing outfit she wore, someone asking her out or hitting on her. But that was because no one knew she was his, and it was frustrating as all hell. He couldn’t hold her as close as he wanted when they danced, and he couldn’t hug her in the middle of the bullpen, and he couldn’t tell Carol he didn’t like his wife to date, and he couldn’t see his ring around her finger. He’d made their bed, and so he’d lay in it and anxiously await the day he could shout how much he loved her. He’d keep the innuendos to a minimum, and hope no one else noticed when he looked at her too long across the bullpen, or hugged her longer than he should, or let his hand drift to her back as they walked.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donna smiled brightly as Josh twirled her out and back to him, holding her close again. They were dancing under the stars at a restaurant on the beach and they’d been here for hours. They were leaving the next day, and so they both wanted to savor the final moments of what Donna was calling their “freedom.”

“I did what you said and I talked to my professors about the possibilities of missed classes.” Donna said.

“And?”

“Well, they’re okay with it, but one of them decided to play a little dirty.” she hedged.

“What’d he chase you around his office?” Josh quipped with a smirk.

“No.” she said rolling her eyes. “But I, of course, had to explain where I worked and who I worked for. And when he found out I worked for you, well, he is a government professor --”

“A lecture?” Josh smiled cutting her off.

“Would you mind?” she grimaced.

“For you? Of course not.” he smiled and was rewarded by her with a soft kiss. “What does he want me to talk about?”

“I don’t know.” she shrugged. “I think a typical day in the White House.”

“You told him there was no such thing, right?” Josh laughed.

“Your typical day, Joshua.”

“I don’t have typical days.”

“Think of something.”

“I will.” he assured. “You set it up and I’ll think of something to talk about, you know, on my way there.”

“Josh!” she pouted. “You are going to take it seriously, right?”

“I absolutely am.” he promised. “I’ll embarrass you and everything.”

“Well, you can exercise some restraint there.”

“Nah, I don’t think I will.”

She rested her head on his shoulder and breathed him in deeply, letting the breath out with a soft smile. “This weekend was so wonderful.” she sighed.

“Yeah.” He agreed dropping a light kiss onto her exposed shoulder.

“It was a really good idea.”

“Thanks.”

“We should do this once a month.”

“I’m pretty sure our schedules won’t allow that.” he laughed.

“I know.”

“I’ll think of something though.”

“You will?”

He chuckled at the surprise he heard in her voice. “I like doing this too, you know! I like being able to show you off and dance close, too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah!”

“Well, I’ll leave it you then.”

“Thank you.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Honey, I’m home!” Josh called jovally entering the apartment late one night.

“It’s about time!” Donna called from the bedroom.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I had to work overtime to earn back the money you lost in the college football pool today.”

“Oh just let it go.”

“Easy for you to say.” he grumbled dropping his backpack onto the floor.

“I have a surprise for you!” Donna announced running from the bedroom and throwing herself at him.

“Enthusiastic welcome home sex?” He asked catching her to his chest.

“Nope.” she said quickly. “Come see. It’s in the bedroom.”

“Ooh. I like the sound of that.”

“I hope so.”

“What?”

“You’ll see.”

She dragged him to the bedroom door and he stopped in his tracks when he saw the bed. Two small kittens where playing there on the comforter.

“Donnatella?” He squeaked.

“Aren’t they adorable?”

“Are they somebody else?”

“Nope, they’re ours.”

“You got two cats?” She nodded her head quickly. “Did you check the lease to find out if we could have cats?”

“Yes.”

“And?”

“We can!”

“Shit.”

“You don’t like them?”

“I don’t like cats, Donna.”

“You don’t?”

“No.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Why are there two of them?”

“Okay. Well, I was just going to get the one, the boy, because one’s a boy and one’s a girl, and the boy had the most adorable brown eyes, like you.” She began rambling, and Josh arched his eyes in surprise and dread. She was way to excited about these cats for him to NOT end up being a cat owner by the end of this conversation. “And the girl,” she continued. “Has blue eyes. And they get along so well together. I really just had to get them both.”

Josh dropped his head to his chest and sighed. No matter how twisted Donna’s logic tended to get, he fell for it every time.

“And you’ve probably named them already, too, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Dare I ask?”

“Abner and Bambi.”

Shit.


	12. Secret, The

“Okay. What’s important here, is that you not lose your shit when I tell you what I’m about to tell you.” Josh announced appearing in front of Donna’s desk. “Really, it’s an opportunity for you.”

Donna looked up and arched her brow at him suspiciously. She could tell by his expression he was absolutely dreading what he was about to say.

“You’re dreading telling me something.” she noted.

“I really am.” he confessed.

“And you think telling me out in the middle of the bullpen is a wise choice for you?” she asked.

“No?”

“I don’t know what it is you have to say, but if you think I’m going to freak out about it and are attempting to tell me where there are witnesses and I have to watch what I say, I can tell you that’s not going to work out to well for you in the end.”

He paused pondering what she said for a moment. “You’re right.” he nodded. “It’s bad either way, but let’s go in my office then.”

“It’s really going to make me freak out?” she asked rising out of her chair and following him into the office.

“It really is.” he said.

They walked into his office and Donna sighed resigned as she watched him close all three doors. “Leo’s making me hire Mandy.” he said quickly scrunching up his face.

“Mandy who?”

“Hampton.”

“Mandy Hampton your ex-girlfriend?”

“The very same.” he said. He watched as her lips tightened into a line and her jaw clenched. Not. Good.

“How exactly is this an opportunity for me?” she asked in a deadly low voice.

“She does exactly what you’re going to school for, so you can see it up close and personal.” he said quickly.

“Really.” she said more as a statement than a question.

“Live and in Technicolor.”

“How exactly is that supposed to make me feel better about YOU having to hire YOUR EX-GIRLFRIEND to work here, a woman who seemed to drop the words, ‘I don’t want to see you any more Mandy’ completely out of her vocabulary, who is now going to be working in close proximity to you where she’ll have NO idea I’m your wife. How again am I supposed to feel better?” she hissed. “This is punishment for the tax fraud thing?”

“I just want to remind you that hiring her was not my idea and I vocally opposed it in Leo’s office.” he said quickly. “You can ask anyone.”

“No, I don’t think I’ll do that.” Donna replied.

“But they’ll back me up.”

“And be suspicious as to why I’m so concerned about it.”

“Shit.”

“Yes, Joshua! Shit!”

He sighed and looked up at her. This was by far the worst part of the plan. On top of the normal stresses of working in the White House and hiding a secret marriage, he had to figure out how to dodge Mandy while appearing to be working with her at the same time, all the while keeping his wife happy.

“I’m sorry.” he said quietly to her. “I really did try to talk Leo out of it.”

“I’m sure you did.” she said softly with a heavy sigh.

“I have to go over to her office after work.”

“Well, I’ll be at class.”

“I’ll wait for you at home.”

“Yeah.” she nodded, then turned and walked out of the office.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“So you like Charlie, huh?” Donna asked looking up from her position on the couch where she had a textbook propped open on the arm of the couch.

“Yeah, he’ll be good.” Josh nodded sitting down next to her.

“You really freaked him out.” she noted highlighting in her book.

“He applied for the messenger position.” 

He stretched out on the couch and settled his head in her lap. Immediately, one of the cats, he had absolutely NO clue which one it was, jumped up on him, and he automatically brushed it away, where it just came right back.

“Donna.” he sighed looking at the cat.

“She likes you.” Donna smiled looking down at Bambi trying to find a comfortable place to lay on Josh.

“What makes you think someone applying for a messenger position would make a good personal aide to the President?” Donna asked moving back to the subject of Charlie Young.

“I don’t know.” Josh shrugged in her lap. “I just do. I guess I just saw someone valuable in him, you know? Smart as whip, despite his age; determination, discretion. I just thought he deserved a chance.” He stopped and looked up at her where she was smiling down with tears in her eyes.

“Let’s go have Josh is so sweet sex.” she smiled.

“Kay.”

But it wasn’t meant to be. Just then, there was a knock on the door. Their eyes widened at each other.

“Tell me you ordered dinner.” Josh pleaded up to her. She shook her head frantically and he sprang off the couch and looked through the peephole. “Shit! It’s Sam!” he whispered harshly.

“What the hell is he doing here?” she demanded heatedly.

“I don’t know.” Josh replied. “What the hell are we going to do?”

“Close the door to the bedroom and let him in.” Donna directed.

“Donna!”

“Just do it.” she ordered. “And let me do the talking.”

Josh did as she directed and took a deep breath before opening the door. “I got to talk to you.” Sam said crossing the threshold, but he stopped short when he saw Donna sitting on the couch. “Oh, hi. I’m sorry. Am I interrupting something?”

“Josh helping me with my con law class.” Donna smiled holding up her textbook.

“Oh.” Sam smiled. “Well, that’s just adorable.”

“Sam?” Josh asked arching a brow at him. “What did you need?”

“Oh yeah.” Sam said then looked around. “You changed your whole apartment.”

Josh looked over at Donna for an explanation. She was ready. “His mother and I ganged up on him.” Donna explained. “It really was a rather ugly green.”

“And you got cats?” Sam continued.

“They’re my roommate’s.” Donna continued. “Our apartment got fumigated.”

Josh’s eyebrows shot up in amazement at how quickly Donna was ready for a response. Must be that semester long drama major she had.

“What’d you need, Sam?” Josh asked. Sam looked a little uncomfortably over at Donna, who was looking at him curiously.

Um...it can wait.” Sam replied.

“Is this about the hooker?” Donna asked.

Sam’s eyes widened in surprise. “She’s a call girl.” Sam said immediately. “And I didn’t give her any money. How do you know anyway?”

“It’s the White House, Sam, everyone knows.” she smiled.

“I can just talk to you about it tomorrow.” Sam said to Josh. “It’s late.”

“Yeah, it is.” Donna agreed stifling a yawn.

“Can I give you a ride home, Donna?” Sam offered.

“Um, no thanks, Sam.” she said momentarily thrown. “I’m not quite done yet. I’ll just make Josh take me home.”

“All right.” Sam shrugged. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

Sam disappeared back through the door. Josh leaned up against the door with a hand on his chest looking over at Donna.

“I can’t believe that just happened.” Josh said. “I really don’t know how much longer we can pull this off.”

“It was YOUR idea.” Donna countered.

“You want to just come clean?”

“We made it a year.” Donna shrugged. “Don’t you think we can make it until I’m done with school?”

“I don’t know.” Josh confessed. “We’re having all these close calls now. If that had been Toby, he would have definitely thought something was up.”

“What makes you think Sam didn’t?” Donna asked.

“He’s too preoccupied with whatever he wanted to talk to me about.”

“The hooker?”

“You really need to stop talking with Margaret.” Josh replied.

“You and Leo know as much as you do because Margaret and I talk to each other and the other assistants so much.” she retorted.

“Still, sometimes you guys talk about stuff you really shouldn’t be talking about.” his voice held a bit of warning, but she shrugged it off. “Anyway, I think we might need to start considering rethinking the plan.”

Donna closed her book and tossed it on the couch. “Well, I think we should get back to the Josh’s is being so sweet sex.”


	13. Secret, The

“For crying out loud, Donna! You got another freaking parking ticket?”

“I couldn’t find a spot.” she shrugged.

“This is your third freaking ticket in a month.” he said slamming around his office.

“I’d rather pay the $30 fee than walk around school in the dark.” Donna said looking at him strangely.

He paused and looked up at her. Well, when she put it that way, it was 90 bucks well spent to him. If she got to be closer to where she was going to be at night, then he’d pay the ticket and shut up about.

“What’s the matter with you today?” she asked cautiously.

“Nothing.” he said quickly looking down and moving things around his desk. “Josh, you look like you’ve seen a ghost. Is it your Cheese Day assignment?”

“No.”

“Has Mandy been bugging you a lot today?” Donna demanded.

“No, it’s not Mandy either.” he sighed.

“But it’s something?”

He looked up at her for a long moment. How did he tell her? He couldn’t tell her about the NSA card. He’d discovered he was the only one that got it. Not CJ; not Sam; not Toby; certainly not Donna. How could he leave her? If there was a nuclear attack, how could he leave her to fend for herself? Maybe her life wasn’t so valuable to the country, but it was priceless to him.

All day, every time he looked at the others, he felt guilty. Guilty that the NSA saw him as more valuable than them, when they had all fought together to get to where they were. Toby deserved to die in a nuclear blast because Leo decided to make Josh his deputy and not him?

If he was guilt-ridden when he looked at his friends, it was nothing compared to how he felt when he looked at Donna. When he looked at her and knew that card was in his wallet, he felt...empty.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about my sister today.” he said softly. Well, she wasn’t expecting that. He’d only mentioned his sister to her once before, when his father died. Donna knew very little about her other than she was older than Josh and died in a house fire.

“Why?” she asked softly.

“I don’t know.” he shrugged. “I just keep thinking about her.”

“What’s going on?” she pleaded again.

“I can’t tell you.” he said breaking eye contact and looking down. Her heart broke for him then. He was so obviously conflicted inside. Something was eating him up and ready to consume him.

She walked over to him and wrapped her arms around him. “You’ll figure it out.” she said softly.

He laughed without humor. “I don’t even know if I’m allowed to figure this out.”

“So quit then.” she smiled.

“I might have to.”

“Joshua.” she chided.

“I don’t know, Donna.” he sighed. “Sometimes this job...”

“You knew that when you signed up for it, didn’t you?”

He did. But he signed up for it when he joined the campaign. Then she came along. And it was fine still for another ten months. He was driven, and focused, and had his eye on the prize.

Then they got drunk and got married.

Some people just get drunk and get tattoos.

It was still worth every minute. He just didn’t know how to balance it. He didn’t know how to reconcile his mind and heart with the darker side of his job when he held everything that was right in his arms. When she looked at him, she was all innocence and naivete and he adored that about her because it kept a part of him pure. But how could he look at her and tell her the world was a cruel and cold place?

“Let’s go get some chili.” she said softly.

“I’ll be up in a little bit, I promise.” he said pulling away.

“Don’t stay down here too long.”

She disappeared out of his office and he smiled. She knew him well. She knew he wanted to be alone for a while to try and figure it out on his own, and she was okay with that.

She was amazing.

Later that night in the Residence, with a sense of newfound purpose, he joined her talking to Margaret and CJ, CJ still going on about Pluie the wolf.

“I’m going to head home, you want a ride?” he asked her.

“Yeah, thanks.” she smiled. They said good night to the President and Leo and slipped out.

“You look lighter.” she noted as they walked through the parking lot to his car.

“Yeah.” he smiled.

“You were talking to the President and Leo for a while.”

“I was.” he confirmed.

“Dare I ask about what?”

“Our women.” he answered immediately.

“You were not.” she laughed.

“Right hand to God, you can ask them.”

They got into the car and sat there a minute while it warmed up.

“You know, it’s not too late for you to call your mom tonight.” she said softly

“I already did.” he smiled, thinking again how well she knew him.

“You feeling better?”

“I am.” he nodded, then leaned his head against the head rest and looked at her, knowing he’d made the only choice there was that evening. If she was going to go through something so horrific as a nuclear explosion or a biological attack, she was going to do it with his body between her and the danger, because he’d be damned if he went to some bunker to strategize how to repopulate America when both of the only people that really mattered to him were gone. When he looked at her up in the Residence, he knew; if she went, he went. There were no other options.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mandy sat perched on Josh’s desk watching him where he was seated writing. She had been spending an awful lot of time in his office since she started working for them, popping in with trivial excuses to fight with him. It was annoying to him, and forget about what it was doing to Donna. However, it wasn’t always without its usefulness. On days when Mandy was particularly aggressive in her chase of Josh, Donna usually attacked him as soon as they walked through the door at home, and that was nothing to complain about.

Josh hadn’t noticed Donna come into the office, rooting through the mounting work on his credenza looking for something. She found a lot of reasons to pop in there and interrupt them when Mandy was in there. He’d get annoyed by it, but he likewise usually found a reason to call her in.

“Let’s do dinner.” Mandy blurted. Josh stopped writing and looked up at her surprised. Donna nearly dropped the file she was holding.

“What?”

“Let’s go to dinner tomorrow night.” Mandy said.

“No.” Josh replied, going back to his writing. Donna turned back to the wall so Mandy couldn’t see her smirk.

“Why not?”

“Because.”

“That’s it? Because.”

“Because you and I aren’t dating.”

“You’re not seeing anyone else.” Mandy countered.

“What makes you say that?” Josh asked.

Donna stopped what she was doing again and looked at him in surprise. Ever since Big Block of Cheese Day, he’d been a little more daring around her, a little more tactile, a little more suggestive in what he allowed people to hear him say to her. It was almost like he was softening the ground a bit.

“Everybody says you’re not seeing anyone.” Mandy replied. “CJ, Sam, Toby.”

Josh sat back in his chair and leaned an elbow on the armrest. “What makes you think I told them whether or not I’m seeing anyone?”

“Oh come on, Josh.” Mandy scoffed. “They’re your friends. You tell them everything.”

“Not remotely everything, Madeline.”

Donna was surprised when Mandy turned back to her. “Is he seeing anyone?” Mandy asked her. Donna had to admit that while Mandy was mostly unpleasant at times, she was never actually mean to Donna. The thought that Donna would be any competition for Josh was just so remote being his assistant that Mandy never took the time to show any competitiveness towards her. Donna smiled coyly at her and turned back to the wall.

“You told DONNA, but you won’t tell anyone else?” Mandy asked incredulously. Josh smiled at Donna’s answer and Mandy’s reaction. Sometimes this secret marriage really was a lot of fun at work. He shrugged at Mandy and went back to what he was writing.

“You’re bluffing.” Mandy determined.

“I’m not.”

“You are. If you’re not, then why doesn’t anyone know who she is? Why are you hiding her?” Mandy countered. Donna held the file in her hand and leaned up against the credenza. She should find a reason to get him out of this conversation. But, quite frankly, he dug himself in this deep and she wanted to see where he was going to go with it.

“Maybe I’m apprehensive to subject her to the media scrutiny that comes with being seen in public with me in this town.” he replied.

“You’re not as popular as you think you are.” Mandy laughed.

“Really? Because you were sitting right there when two girls asked for my autograph.” Josh countered.

“If you’re worried about the press, it’s because she would cause a scandal.” Mandy goaded.

“She’s not going to cause a scandal.” Josh replied.

“Is she a Republican?”

“Bite your tongue, Madeline.”

“Is she going to be going with you to the state dinner tonight?” Mandy prodded.

“More or less.” Josh replied and Donna’s eyes widened. How the hell was he going to explain that later? She was working tonight, but she wasn’t going to be at the dinner itself.

“She’s an invited guest?”

“Mandy, this part of my life isn’t your business anymore.” Josh said finally ending the conversation.

Mandy stood up, undeterred. “Well, save me a dance for old time’s sake then, Joshua. I always was a sucker for you in a tux.”

She sauntered out of the room and Josh leaned forward and started banging his head on the desk repeatedly.

“You brought it on.” Donna said moving towards him. “You lead her there. You could have stopped it any time.”

He scrubbed a hand over his face and looked up at her. He was softening the ground. He was a little more bold with her. He wanted to plant the seed of question before they came clean, reactions might not be so explosive when they did finally come clean. So he could be seen walking closer to her; dancing closer to her, being more flirty. And it was working. The others sometimes gave them a second look. CJ was studying them much closer. He could almost see the wheels turning in her head.


	14. Secret, The

“You’re actually buying a book?” Mandy asked Josh arching a brow as they stood at the counter of the rare book shop, while the President was still pouring over the bookshelves.

“I am.” he smiled.

“The Art and Artistry of Alpine Skiing?” Mandy asked. “Who is that for?”

“Donna.”

“You’re buying Donna a rare book?”

“Didn’t I just say that?”

“You don’t think she’s got enough to read right now with all those classes she’s taking?”

“It’s not for her to read.”

“You’re buying her a book that you don’t expect her to read? May I ask why?”

“No, Madeline, you may not.”

“Oh, this is a good find.” the clerk at the register noted to Josh as she rang up the book. “It’s got a molted calf cover and original drab boards.”

“I don’t know what the hell that means.” Josh said to the clerk.

“Don’t worry,” Mandy laughed. “I’m sure Donna will. She’s far more smarter than you anyway.”

“Why don’t you go shopping, Mandy, and stop bugging me.” Josh said.

“Because bugging you is far more entertaining. And have you looked at the expression on Leo’s face recently? He looks like he wants to beat himself over his head with a few of these musty old books.”

“In the Oval, you were talking about how charming the President doing his own shopping in a rare book store was.”

“Sure, in the press.” Mandy retorted. “I didn’t want to actually come.” She turned back to the counter and her eyes bugged out of her head when she saw the price of the book. “That’s quite the price tag for a gift for your assistant.”

“She’s a good assistant, I appreciate what she does.”

“For that price you could get her diamonds, Joshua.” Mandy quipped. “And she’ll probably wear them, as opposed to a book that you don’t expect her to read...” she drifted off, and followed Josh outside to the motorcade. “What’s going on, Josh?”

“I’m waiting by the motorcade.” Josh said. “It’s too hot in there.”

“Why are you buying Donna something so expensive?”

“I bought her a book.”

“That cost $300.”

“I told you, I appreciate her.”

“Is she going to appreciate this book?”

“Yes.”

“Does she collect rare books?”

“She’s well read, and has an extensive library.”

“Of rare books?”

“Mandy, seriously, me and Donna aren’t any of your concern. She’s my assistant; she’s my friend; she works hard for me, on top of going to college at night and on the weekends, and my choice of gift is of no concern to you.”

Mandy pouted and leaned up against the car to wait for the President. Josh could tell she wasn’t buying it, and he didn’t care. A couple more bucks and he could have bought her the skies she asked for, but he was struck by inspiration when he saw it. That Mandy stuck annoyingly to his side like glue was an unfortunate occurrence at the moment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He smiled when he heard his office door shut softly behind him. She came in after him; the hug obviously not being an adequate thank you for her. When he turned around, her mouth was immediately on his, the book still clutched tightly in her hand, her arms wrapping around him.

He had no idea what possessed him to give it to her in the middle of the bullpen, but once he had it ready, he didn’t want to wait anymore.

“That is the sweetest thing you’ve ever said to me.” she said through her tears.

“Well, I didn’t say it, so much as I wrote it.” he countered.

“Written proof that you love me.”

“You have verbal proof of it; I tell you all the time.”

“This was just so wonderful.” She said pulling away and opening it up.

“It’s not your skies.”

“It’s way better than skies.” she whispered. “You came up with this all on your own?”

“Of course I did!” he exclaimed. “You think I had Sam write it?”

“It’s so eloquent.”

“I can be eloquent.”

“I guess you can.”

“You guess.”

“I meant it in a good way.”

“Mandy was with me when I bought it; she said I could have gotten you diamonds instead with what I spent on it.”

“Mandy’s an idiot that wouldn’t know real sentiment if it came up and introduced itself to her.”

“But not you.” he said softly leaning in to kiss her again.

“This is way better than diamonds.” she smiled.

“You want to go listen to the Christmas music?”

She nodded and he led her out of the office and to the lobby. He smiled when he saw she still carried the book.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Who’s Lord Marbury?” Donna asked falling into step with Josh in the corridor.

“He’s not here is he?” Josh asked quickly.

“No, but he’s coming.”

“He’s a crackpot, and you’re to stay very far away from him.”

“Is he a real Earl?”

“That’s what he claims.”

“Why can’t I meet him?”

“Because he’s nearly always drunk, he’s completely eccentric, and he’s been known to grab certain, well, assets of the First Lady’s, and if he does that to you, I’ll be sure to make the papers again.”

“I’d like to see you explain that.” Donna laughed.

“Why is he coming here anyway?”

“The Pakistan thing.”

Josh stopped and looked at her. “You really need to stop talking to Margaret.”

“CJ got the question in her briefing this morning.”

“Shit.”

“Apparently, she’s mighty pissed.”

“I would think.”

“She thinks she got purposely left out of the loop.”

“She did.”

“You still upset about the deposition?”

“Why don’t we get a little closer to the press room when you say shit like that out loud.” he snapped.

“Because I was oh so specific in my question.” she shot at him.

He stopped walking with a sigh and dropped his head to his chest. “I didn’t mean...”

“I know.”

“Between this Pakistan stuff, the deposition, this day is really sucking.”

“Mandy wants to work for a republican.”

“Good riddance to her.”

“In addition to working for us.”

“Yeah, because I need THAT today, too.”

They started walking again, and Donna resisted the urge to grab his hand. He was frustrated, and the day just got worse and worse. When they reached his office, she followed him in.

“You should really try not to stay so late tonight.” she whispered moving directly next to him. His eyebrows shot up when he heard the huskiness to her voice.

“Why’s that?”

“I have an idea of how to relieve all this tension.”

“You do? How’s that?”

“It involves, candles, and wine, and the bathtub....” she let her words trail off suggestively and he successfully fought back the urge to spin around and kiss her.

“Okay.” he squeaked instead.

“I’ll see you after class.”

He nodded quickly. “There’s very few people I don’t want to punch right now, Donna, so stay away from Marbury.”


	15. Secret, The

“You still smell.” Donna noted annoyed.

“I’m better now that you got me fresh clothes.”

“I’m not speaking to you.”

“Would you really have wanted me to call --”

“YES!”

“I lost track of time!” he defended.

“And how many women were around.”

“I wasn’t around women.”

“You were sleeping on your office floor with a pair of red women’s underwear around your neck talking about strippers.” she said in a deadly quiet voice that made him take a step back from her.

“I didn’t touch them.” he said quickly.

“Did they touch you?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You don’t THINK so!?” she shrieked.

“I thought you weren’t going to yell.” he cringed holding a hand to his head.

“YOU THOUGHT WRONG JACKASS!” she yelled and stomped off as Sam walked up to Josh’s office.

“Wow. What’d you do?” Sam asked.

“I think it’s the condition she found me in this morning.” Josh said.

“Ah. I was wondering what she needed the foul weather gear for.” Sam said. “She said something about you smelling like a dumpster.”

“Really, I think it was just her revenge.” Josh confided. “Because now that I’m thinking clearly, I know she knows I have spare clothes downstairs in the locker room.”

“Wow. Donna’s not one to cross, is she?”

“She’s really not.”

“Who saw you in my foul weather gear?”

“Joey Lucas, her interpreter, and anyone who’s working out there in the bullpen today.” Josh replied.

Sam tried to stifle a laugh, but was unsuccessful. The thought of Josh dressed up like the Gorton’s Fisherman while standing in the middle of the White House must have been pretty hysterical. Josh tried to be annoyed, but he couldn’t help but admire his wife’s fiestiness. She was monstrously pissed at him, and he was sure to be in the doghouse for a while, but she really could fight dirty when she wanted to.

The object of his affection came stomping back into the room but stopped when she saw Sam.

“How’s it going, Donna?” Sam asked.

“Oh, just fine, Sam.” she hissed.

“I understand you’re having quite the day.”

“You could say that.”

“Why don’t I take you to lunch and you can tell me the whole story.” Sam offered.

“Do I look like Scheherazade to you, Sam?” she snapped.

“Okay then.” Sam said surprised.

“You’re not pissed at Sam, Donna.” Josh reminded.

“You’re right, I’m not.” she agreed with a glare in his direction. “I’m really sorry, Sam. I would like to join you for lunch, but first I need to see if my staggeringly inconsiderate --“

“Donna.” Josh said quickly. He didn’t care so much about the insult, but he didn’t want her to say the wrong thing.

“-- boss --“ she covered. “needs anything first.”

She turned and looked at Josh with a glare that clearly said, whatever-you-need-you-can-get-it-your-own-damn-self. “Sure, you can go.”

“We should bring you back something you can rehydrate with.” Sam said to Josh.

“He can drag his hungover, stinky, disrespectful --“ Donna began, but Josh cut her off.

“Know what, Sam? She’ll meet you in your office. I need to talk to her for a second.”

“Yeah. Good luck.” Sam said making a hasty retreat and closing the door behind him.

“I’m really sorry.” Josh said as soon as the door closed.

“You didn’t come home or call.”

“I was really very drunk.”

“You smell like it.”

“How can I make it better?” he pleaded.

“You’ll definitely have to grovel for a while.”

“I can grovel.”

“It’s possible I might make you do the majority of the work on my mid-term paper.”

“What’s is on?”

“The ERA.”

“No problem.”

“Without you getting freaked out about it and spouting off about the 14th Amendment.”

“Um...okay. I support the ERA.”

“You get freaked out by the ERA.”

“I get freaked out by Nazi feministas...”

“Josh.”

“Sorry. ERA, no problem. What else?”

“I don’t know, but I’ll think of more. For now, you can start with the massive amounts of groveling.”

“How about a hug?” he asked hopefully.

“Are you kidding me?” She returned in disgust. “I can see the green haze emanating off you. You’ve got radioactive stuff all over you, and you’re not coming near me until you have thoroughly showered and chipped it off.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Donna, does Josh have a minute?” CJ asked walking up to Donna’s cubicle where Donna was powering down her computer.

“No.” Donna replied. “We’re dangerously close to being late as it is.”

“Late for what?” CJ asked as Josh came rushing out of his office and putting his jacket on.

“You ready?” he asked Donna.

“Yup.”

“Late for what?” CJ demanded again.

“Josh is lecturing at my school tonight.” Donna said, throwing her tote bag over her shoulder.

“I don’t remember seeing a copy of any speeches come by my desk.” CJ said looking at them.

“It’s not a speech; it’s a lecture.” Josh replied.

“On what?” CJ asked.

Josh shrugged and Donna’s jaw dropped. “Joshua!” she chided. “You said you’d think of something.”

“Last time you flew by the seat of your pants, Joshua, you thought up the President’s Secret Plan to Fight Inflation.” CJ said still sore about the briefing earlier.

“THAT’S what I’ll talk about!”

“Joshua!” CJ shouted.

“I don’t have to clear lectures through the press office, CJ.” Josh reminded. He stuck his hands in his pockets, then stuck his elbow out to Donna, who looped her arm through his and CJ watched them walk away down the corridor together and out the bullpen doors.

She’d been watching them with a lot more interest lately. For a boss and assistant who got drunk, married, and then annulled, it didn’t seem to bother them or make them at all uncomfortable with each other to have that sort of odd moment in their past. She started to watch them too closely again, and so she gave her head a shake and went back to her office.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donna sat in the audience and tried to blend in. Professor Nessler continued to rattle off Josh’s impressive resume as girls around her whispered and giggled, waiting for Josh to come on stage. Donna could see him off stage on his phone, looking like he was having a heated discussion with someone. He snapped it shut, turned and looked directly at her. She could tell something had just happened. It couldn’t be too serious if he wasn’t leaving, but he looked none too happy. She saw him flip open his phone and begin pressing buttons, then she felt hers vibrate in her pocket.

He sent her a text.

She opened up her phone, punched in her password and her eyes widened at the message, “Mendoza arrested.” She looked up at him in astonishment, conveying her question. He shrugged in response, just as Professor Nessler announced his name.

The applause and catcalls for him were dying in her ears as she tried to concentrate on her husband on stage. You’d never know that something completely unrelated and on a crises level was also occupying his mind. She was barely cognizant of the fact that he pointed her out as his assistant and promised to embarrass her whenever he was given the opportunity.

He was confident, poised, well-spoken, funny, energetic, candid, and if you knew him as well as she did, totally preoccupied. His cell phone rang and he looked very surprised. He stepped away to answer it and the girls around her pounced on her.

“You work for him?”

“Yes.” Donna nodded.

“Is he as awesome as he seems?”

“Yes.” Donna replied. She could think of many other words to describe him as well, some that weren’t as flattering, but, well...she did agree with them.

“He’s really good looking?”

“Yes.” Donna agreed.

“How can you work with him every day and not just want to jump him?”

Oh, the places she could go. But she didn’t have to answer because her phone vibrated again, and she saw Josh returning to his seat. “T + S lost in CT; lite bldg on fire.” She smiled and chuckled and looked back up at him. He smiled at her, and a girl sitting next to Donna sighed. Then the Professor continued with the questions and Josh covered what the phone call was.

After Josh got finished talking about his briefing from hell and her lack of support in him, the Professor decided to take a break. Josh walked over, plucked her out of her seat and lead her out in the lobby.

“This is a disaster.” he said heatedly in her ear.

“Nah, you’re doing great.” she smiled.

“I meant...”

“I know what you meant.” she replied pulling him through the lobby. He opened his phone and started dialing.

“You’re great.” a girl smiled to him as they past.

“Thanks.”

“You’re great.” Donna mimicked in disgust. “They want to know how I can work with you every day and not push you up against the door of your office.”

“That’s not a bad idea.” he smirked waiting for his call to connect.

“What the hell is going on?”

“All I know is Judge Mendoza got arrested in Connecticut and Toby and Sam went to go bail him out and got lost.” Josh explained.

“You’re right; this is a disaster.” she agreed as she waiting for Josh to finish the call.

“They just got there.” he said hanging up.

“We don’t know what he got arrested for?”

“Not yet.”

He led her back inside and squeezed her hand as he walked back up on stage and she took her seat. He wasn’t talking long before he got another phone call, but no text followed. After another phone call, her phone buzzed again. She smiled when she saw one word, “phew.”

“Is he sending you messages from up there?” a girl asked.

“Yeah.” she smiled.

“Why?”

“He’s efficient.”


	16. Secret, The

“Where’d Donna run off to?” Joey Lucas said through her interpreter Kenny.

Josh sat down at the table on the patio to join her. “She’s off to harass Matthew Perry.” he laughed. “I think it’s a race to see how many restraining orders she can get filed against her before we head back to Washington.”

“She’s starstruck; it’s happened to all of us at some point or another.” Joey smiled.

“Yeah.” he agreed.

“Quite a successful night.” Joey noted.

“Hey, I’m just happy CJ’s managed to not fall in the pool.” Josh smiled.

“The President looks tired.”

“The President IS tired, Joey.” Josh replied. “But he’ll sleep on the plane on the way back.”

“You all seem preoccupied tonight.”

“There’s a vote happening.”

“Ethanol.”

“Yeah.”

“Won’t pass.”

“Doesn’t look like it.” Josh replied taking a sip of his drink.

“How long have you and Donna been together?” Joey asked causing Josh to choke on said drink.

“What makes you think that?” he sputtered.

“I’m deaf, not blind.” she replied in her own voice.

“Um...well...”

“I’m also not a reporter.” Joey reminded.

“Since the election.” Josh admitted sheepishly. And for the first time, he felt like a little bit of the burden was being lifted. It felt good to talk about it with someone who wasn’t A, Donna; or B, one of their parents.

“She’s the one.” Joey noted.

“What makes you say that?”

“Josh, you don’t get as far as you have in life by being uneducated. Surely, in all your studying, you learned somewhere along the way that when someone is without one of their basic senses, they compensate by heightening the others. I read people well. I have two eyes in my head. When you can’t hear, you have to watch. I’ve watched you two.”

“Boy nothing gets past you.”

“But it’s gotten past the others.”

“Barely.”

“Are you going to tell them?”

“I want to.” Josh said quietly looking down at his drink.

“You’re afraid of public perception because she works for you.” Joey concluded.

“She’s not going to work for me much longer.” Josh replied. “She graduates in December.”

“Politicians are so concerned with public perception, though admittedly if they weren’t I’d be unemployed.” Joey said. “Elected officials are supposed to lead by example and they rarely set good ones. There’s nothing wrong with falling in love. I’ve seen the way you two look at each other. I know it’s not some tawdry affair.”

“It’s not.” Josh agreed. “It’s a marriage made in heaven.”

“Ah, I see.”

“I bet you do.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Josh?” Donna whispered into the darkened hotel room. Josh bolted up in bed at the sound of her voice and turned on a light.

“What are you doing here?” He asked reaching out for her.

“Ginger hooked up.” Donna smiled.

“Ginger is turning out to be a bit ho-ish.”

“Nah, she’s dating a guy from advance. She has been since, apparently, election night.”

“I guess we all got lucky that night.” he murmured as she moved into his arms on the bed. “Joey outed us tonight.”

“To who?” Donna asked her eyes widening.

“To me.”

“Where’d we slip up?”

“Apparently, it’s the way we look at each other.” Josh informed pulling her down with him against the pillows.

“Well, that’s the sweetest thing I ever did hear.” Donna said snuggling against him.

“What? Why?”

“Joey’s deaf.” Donna shrugged. “She compensates by being more observant. We give off a love mojo.”

“A love mojo?” Josh laughed. “I don’t know that I want to give off a love mojo.”

“Trust me, you do. It’s very sexy.”

“It’s very...Sam-ish.”

“Women like men like Sam, you know.” Donna said. “He’s very understanding and charming.”

“I thought you said I was charming.”

“You aren’t without your charms.”

“And apparently my love mojo.”

“You send it out in waves.”

“You crack me up.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“What’s got you so pumped up tonight?” Donna asked as she watched Josh bounce around the apartment with pent up energy.

“I get to kick some ass with the FEC nominations.” he grinned.

“Leo’s letting you off the leash?” Donna asked incredulously.

“He is.” Josh confirmed. She smiled as she saw how excited he got; finally, something to fight for; finally getting to do something without having to worry about pissing off too many people.

“So I was thinking about doing a little more redecorating.” she said.

That effectively stopped the bouncing.

“What?”

“Hardwood floors and ceramic tile in the kitchen.”

“We’re RENTING this place, Donna.”

“The landlord said we could do it.”

“I bet he did. It’ll up the value of his building.”

“It’ll look really nice.”

“Is the landlord going to pay for it?”

“Um, no.”

“Well, neither are we.”

“The hardwood floors will do wonders for your stress levels.” Donna argued.

“WHAT?” Josh laughed. “How the hell do you figure that?”

“Hardwood floors give a more cozy feel to a room. Cozy is synominous with comfort. When you walk through the door, you’ll feel more comfortable at home and less stressed out.”

Josh paused and looked at her; she was working her Donna logic. “You’re getting incredibly good at the spin thing.” he said not falling for it.

“The whole reason why I painted the living room this color was because it would go beautifully with the hardwood floors I wanted.” she pouted sitting back on the couch forcefully.

“Well, that didn’t work out the way you wanted it to, now did it?” He laughed at her continued pout, marveling in how for once he was impervious to her, and sat down next to her. “How about in celebration of your new job, when you get one, we go shopping for townhouses?”

“Really?” she asked brightening up.

“With the requirement for hardwood floors.”

“Kay.” she said leaning in and kissing him.

Maybe he wasn’t as impervious to her as he thought.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Josh had no sooner walked through their apartment door behind Donna then she turned, pushed him up against it, and kissed him deeply.

“Um...Donna?” he asked between kisses as she pushed his tuxedo jacket off his shoulders. “Not that I’m not like totally for this...”

“When you told that senator to take his legislative agenda and shove it up his ass...” she confessed pulling his bow tie apart. “That was REALLY hot, Joshua.”

“That turned you on?!” he squeaked.

“You have no idea.”

“I think I’m getting one.” he said in between her kisses. She worked on the buttons of his shirt while he worked on her neck. “I say that kind of stuff all the time.”

“Not while wearing formal wear, you don’t.”

“Speaking of hot, we should talk about this dress.”

“It’s my little black dress.”

“Little being the operative word there.”

She stopped and pulled back. “You don’t like my dress?”

“I love your dress.”

“Thank you.”

“Senator Shilling’s chief of staff loved it, too.”

“He asked me if I would wear it to dinner with him.”

“That was a little obnoxious to say right in front of your husband.”

“He didn’t know he was right in front of my husband.”

“Damn that minor detail.”

“You’re the one that said we need to get a grip because people were going to say that kind of stuff around us.”

“I changed my mind. I’m a politician; I’m allowed to do that.”

“You’re so hot tonight, Josh, I’m sweating over here.”

“That’s a guy’s line, Donna.”

“Did it work?”

“Of course it did. That’s why guys use it; it’s a sure thing.”


	17. Secret, The

CJ burst into Josh’s office through their connecting door like a woman possessed. Lucky for her, Donna was in there sitting across from Josh as they worked on whatever it was they were working on today. She stormed across the office, slamming both his doors, while Donna watched astounded, and more than a little bit afraid; Josh merely observed the tornado.

“YOU HAVEN’T TAKEN CARE OF IT YET!?” she demanded hotly. While she mostly trained her murderous glare on Josh, she did offer it to Donna occasionally, as well. Donna actually gulped and looked wide eyed at CJ; Josh on the other hand, though he had no idea what the hell CJ was talking about, refused to cower in fear of her. If he didn’t cower in fear in front of congress, he sure as hell wasn’t going to do it in front of CJ, though admittedly, she was putting on a good show.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Josh asked.

“Danny saw you two leaving Josh’s apartment together yesterday morning.” CJ said. “Upon a little check of the DC court system, I do not find any divorce judgment entered or an action filed with your names on it.”

Josh and Donna exchanged a quick glance with each other. Donna looked panicked; Josh still didn’t look phased.

“Oh well, we just haven’t gotten around to it yet, CJ.” Donna said timidly. “It’s been pretty busy here; we’ve been working a lot.”

“For a year and a half?” CJ countered. She was mostly amazed to have discovered this morning that they were still married. They were supposed to have taken care of this before the inauguration for crying out loud.

“Donna.” Josh finally spoke. “I think we should come clean, and it probably should be CJ first.” Donna sighed and looked up at CJ.

“What do you mean come clean, Josh?” CJ had now lowered her voice to a normal speaking level, however, it was still a rather intimidating tone. Josh, however, refused to be intimidated by it. He leaned casually back in his chair and looked up at her.

“We changed our minds.” He said simply shrugging. “We decided to stay married.”

“Are you stupid?” CJ demanded.

“Not remotely.” Josh countered.

“ARE YOU STUPID!?” CJ demanded again. She dropped down into the second visitor’s chair next to Donna and sighed dramatically and dropped her face into her hands. “This isn’t happening to me. You aren’t doing this to me.”

“We’re not doing anything to you, CJ.” Josh said. “I’ll admit that a drunken wedding after Election Day was probably not the best way to go about that, but quite frankly, I think it’s one of the smartest things I’ve ever done.” Donna smiled affectionately at him, and then looked guardedly over at CJ, who was now peering out at Josh between her fingers. CJ refused to be swayed by a moment of sweetness from him.

“You have no intention of filing for a divorce?” CJ asked. Josh shook his head. CJ looked over at Donna for confirmation, but it was written all over her face as she was beaming over at him still. “Josh, Danny saw you. How do you think it’s going to look? You hired your WIFE to work for you. You can get sued for unfair hiring practices by the people you didn’t hire for her job; people are going to say nasty things about Donna. If this gets out, it’s going to be ugly.”

“That’s what you get paid to deal with.” Josh countered. CJ groaned and rolled her eyes. “And I suppose Mandy.”

CJ looked back and forth between them another minute or two before coming to a decision. “Okay. I don’t want to keep this a secret, but I also don’t want to make a big thing out of it either. So tomorrow, once we’re past this Town Hall meeting, the three of us and Mandy are going to sit down and plot out a strategy and pitch it to Leo.”

“CJ.” Josh sighed.

“That’s the deal, Josh.” CJ said. “The deal we had was that I keep my mouth shut and you two take care of it. Well, you’re deciding not to take care of it, so I’m not keeping my mouth shut. You aren’t sending all three of us up the river, Joshua.”

Josh rolled his eyes and tossed his pen on his desk. “Fine.” He sighed. “We’ll have all the strategy sessions you want.”

“It’ll probably mean that Donna has to transfer.” CJ warned. Donna’s eyes grew wide and she looked over to Josh in a panic. Once again, Josh seemed unworried by what CJ was saying.

“Not going to happen.” Josh replied. “In the last year and a half, we have more than proven that not only are we professional, but that we work well together, and we get the job done. You’re the only one in this building who knows we got married. No one else has a clue, that’s how professional we are. Donna’s not transferring.”

“Josh, you’re going to have to compromise here, too.” CJ said. “It might be the only thing that keeps this from being a PR disaster.”

“I hardly think it’s going to be a disaster.” He replied.

“Are you two actually living together?” CJ asked.

“Yes.” Donna answered.

“How does HR not catch this?”

“Donna’s got a post office box. She’s had one since she moved to Washington.” Josh explained. “She kept it.”

“What about your taxes?”

“What about them?” Josh sighed.

“What do you put?”

“We filed married.” Josh said. “CJ, the IRS isn’t going to catch something like that. They don’t care. It’s just some random person at a desk entering the data into a computer. So what? So the White House Deputy Chief of Staff is married. Big deal. Oh, he’s married to someone that works in the White House? Big surprise. You think some random IRS employee knows the name of my assistant? If you don’t work for the executive or legislative branches of this government directly, you don’t know Donna’s name.”

“The simplicity of this astounds me.” CJ sighed standing up. “All right. I’m going to get everything ready for the thing tonight.”

Once she had closed the door to her office, Donna looked over at Josh. “Josh.” She said quietly.

“I can’t even tell you how much this is not going to be a thing, Donna.” He said heading off her argument. “It’ll be a thing with the senior staff and the Leo, but nobody outside this building is going to care. We’ve taken care of everything.”

“Which is what’s making me feel dishonest about the whole thing.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re going to be portrayed as the ruthless politician preying on your innocent assistant, and I’m going to be the blonde strumpet that slept her way into the White House.”

“One person says that about you, Donna, and you’ll see just how ruthless I can be.” Josh countered. “Don’t you trust me?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then this is one of those times that you’re supposed to just trust me.” She sighed and leaned back in her chair. “And a little support just before wouldn’t have been like totally unfounded either. You clammed up!”

“She was scary!” Donna defended.

“Please.” Josh scoffed.

“Leo’s going to be ten times that.”

“Again, please.” He scoffed again. He sat forward in his chair and looked back down at the house resolution they were picking apart. “You coming to the thing tonight or not?”

“No.” Donna replied. “The plumber’s coming, remember?”

“Do you really need a refrigerator that makes its own ice?” Josh sighed running his hand over his face. “I mean, you can’t just take the tray out of the freezer?”

“It also has its own water.” Donna reminded. “It’s way better than crappy DC water. The guy’s got to cut the line and hook it up.”

“Kay.”

“And don’t be getting sucked in by the state of the art media room upstairs tonight to watch that silly softball game.” Donna reminded.


	18. Secret, The

“Josh’s procedure is likely to take 12 to 14 hours,” the doctor was saying to a still stunned senior staff. CJ, Toby, Sam, and Leo were all in a private waiting room in GW. They had just gotten news that the President was okay and the doctor was just starting to explain what was going on with Josh. “it would be helpful to be able to talk to his wife.” The doctor said.

“I’ll be calling his mother in a few minutes,” Leo explained to the doctor. “Josh isn’t married.”

“Oh, I just assumed when I saw the wedding band around his neck.” The doctor replied. Three out of the four other faces in the room shared a decidedly blank expression, as CJ’s eyes widened.

“I don’t know what that’s about, doctor,” Leo continued. “but Josh doesn’t have a wife.”

“Actually,” CJ piped up quietly. “she should be here any minute.”

“What?” Leo asked confused.

“CJ,” Sam said. “Josh doesn’t have a wife.”

“She’ll be here soon.” CJ repeated.

“CJ,” Toby said quietly. “I know you hit your head on the ground earlier. This is Josh we’re talking about though, he’s really not married.”

“He really is.” CJ replied. She looked at her three co-workers who were now giving her quizzical and concerned looks. At that moment, Donna walked in. All eyes immediately fell on her.

“I'm sorry, they told me I should come back here? I'm sorry.” She said upon her entrance. “Is there word on the President?"

“The President's going to be fine. “ CJ explained dreading what came next.

“Oh, thank God. Oh, thank God, that's the best news I've ever heard. I got here as fast as I could--I had a hard time getting in. I had ... I had to find an agent who knew me and I was shaking ... I was just ... I didn't know --”

“Donna ... Josh was hit.” Toby interrupted.

Donna stared at Toby in disbelief for a moment. No. It couldn’t be. She immediately noticed when she walked in that he wasn’t in the room. But she figured there was a good reason for it. She just assumed he was talking to the secret service or on the phone with the office, or forgot to call her again, or any one of a hundred other things than what Toby was saying. “Hit with what?”

“He was shot. In the chest.” Toby continued.

“He's in surgery right now. “ CJ explained.

“I don't understand. I don't understand, is ... is it serious?” Please say no, please say no, please say no, she begged inside.

“Yes. It's critical. The bullet collapsed his lung and damaged a major artery.” For as long as she lived, Donna would remember this as the moment when the world came crashing down around her. Somewhere in this building, her husband was dying. CJ stood up and moved quickly over to her.

“You have to go with the doctor right now, Donna.” CJ explained. She made eye contact with the doctor and nodded towards Donna indicating this was who he was waiting for. “He needs to talk to you. Do you want me to come with you?” Donna shook her head, as the tears rolled down her face. This was all so surreal. The doctor held out his arm in gesture towards the opposite door. Donna wiped the tears from her face and left the waiting room with the doctor.

Toby, Sam, and Leo watched the door close in disbelief. Leo recovered first and turned to CJ.

“What the hell was that?” He growled.

“Josh’s wife.” CJ replied simply.

“CJ, I know they’re close,” Leo continued. “and she probably does have the answers the doctor’s looking for, but you can’t just make up spouses for people. Josh’s mother is his next of kin.”

“No, not since after Election Day.” CJ admitted. Three stunned faces looked back at her.

“CJ,” Sam said incredulously. “are you saying Josh and Donna are married?” CJ nodded.

“How is that possible?” Leo demanded.

“They got drunk, just like we all did, the day after the election celebrating. How the idea came about, I don’t know, but they ended up getting married. They came to me immediately; I told them to fix it. I only just found out yesterday that they had changed their minds. They’ve been married and working together since after the election.” CJ explained.

“Josh hired his wife as his assistant?” Sam asked. “We’re going to get sued over that one.”

Dawning suddenly settled over Leo. “No.” he said. “I hired Josh’s wife as his assistant. I always knew he was crafty.”

“What do you mean?” Toby asked.

“Josh was adamant that I do the ultimate hiring of his assistant.” Leo recounted. “He did the initial interviews, wheedled it down to four candidates that he thought he could work with, one of whom was Donna, and sent them to me for the final say so. I chose Donna because she had already worked with him, and I knew she could keep him in line. Hiring her was completely on the up and up.”

“Which she certainly has.” Sam said with a smile. He was still stunned by the news, but he was also finding the situation a little amusing. As Josh’s best friend, he admittedly was a little hurt that they hadn’t confided in him, but he was also impressed that not a single person suspected anything remotely like this. Talk about keeping up appearances.

“They were going to come to you about this tomorrow.” CJ told Leo. “We were going to sit down with Mandy tomorrow, plot out a strategy to release it and then pitch it to you.”

“Well, it’s pretty easy to release it now.” Toby said quietly.

“How’s that?” Sam asked.

“CJ will be giving updates on him in her briefings.” Toby said. “She can just throw in that his wife is at his side. Really, does it matter that it’s Donna? If they got married before the inauguration, there was really no need to issue a press release on it. I mean, it’s not like we’re required to release the names of the people we hired and their marital status.”

“What happens when someone from the press corps wants a follow up on that?” CJ asked. “Most of the reporters were with us on the campaign.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize Josh was married.” Sam said in press mode.

“Yes, Josh was married shortly after the election.” Toby responded.

“To whom?” Sam continued.

“We don’t release the names of White House staff’s families. It’s the White House’s policy not to comment on the personal lives of its staff.” Toby ended.

“You two should take that act on the road.” Leo quipped.

“Okay, wait a minute.” CJ said. “The President is going to be okay. Josh is the other guy that got shot. You don’t think his life is going to come under the microscope right now? You don’t think they’re going to be looking for an interview with his wife?”

“Sure.” Sam said. “But come on. This is Josh and Donna we’re talking about. Do YOU think Donna’s going to leave this building without Josh? Donna’s going no where until he’s well on the way to recovery, and by then, I don’t know that anyone’s going care about that so much. Besides, we can release a statement to the press on behalf of his family. We can have his mother do it.”

“Or maybe we can it run in Danny’s column.” Toby voiced. “He can refer to her as Mrs. Lyman. I think he’ll agree to that, since he’ll be the only reporter with a quote from her. Everyone else will back off after that. The other reporters will follow his lead, I’m sure. He’s the senior White House correspondent, they’re not going to cross him on something trivial like that.”

“Danny’s asking about the 25th Amendment right now.” CJ reminded. “I’ve been trying to avoid him until we have an answer.”

“We’re going to need to talk to Donna about this.” Leo sighed.

“Leo,” CJ said. “the last thing Donna’s going to care about right now is how to release her marriage to the press.”

“I don’t mean right this minute.” Leo barked in reply. “But in the next day or so, we’re going to have to talk to her about it. She’s in charge of him right now, she’s going to be calling the shots.”


	19. Secret, The

Donna fingered the wedding band around her neck as she watched the doctors with Josh through the observation window. The ER nurses had brought her the personal things Josh had on him when he came in, his wallet, cell phone, and wedding ring. She had taken her wedding ring off its chain and put it on her finger, and then put his on the chain around her neck.

The First Lady had explained to her what was happening to him right now and what they were doing. She understood it, but she still felt like she was watching this happen to someone else. When she had gotten to the hospital, the doctor had asked her whether or not he had a living will; whether or not he was allergic to any medications; what his medical history was. It was only just occurring to her now the rest of the senior staff, and Leo, probably had a few questions for her. She was reluctant to leave her spot, but she knew that Josh would also want her taking care of their office. She supposed this was one of those things that needed to be taken care of.

She made her way back down to the waiting room. Not surprisingly, they were all there. She saw CJ’s briefing earlier, so she knew that they had left and came back. They were in there now with Leo. Yesterday, the thought of telling Leo this scared her out of her mind. Today, she didn’t care what anybody had to say about it. She pushed open the door and walked inside.

“Any news?” Sam asked as he, Toby, and Leo stood up when she entered.

“No.” Donna said softly. “But Mrs. Bartlet told me that they would be finishing up in an hour or so and there haven’t really been any complications.” They nodded and Donna noted how the three senior staffers’ gaze seemed to drift over to Leo. They must be waiting for his reaction.

Leo walked over until he was standing right in front of her. Donna was certain that he was going to start screaming at her. She tried to prepare herself for this moment, but now that it was here, she wasn’t sure she was going to be able to handle it. Then, the most unusual thing happened.

He hugged her.

“You’re practically my daughter in law.” He said. The hug was over as quickly as it started. Donna was completely stunned. That was the exact OPPOSITE reaction she was expecting.

“Very classy, Leopold.” CJ said softly.

“You’re not mad at us?” Donna asked hesitantly.

“Oh, this has Josh’s idiot fingerprints all over it.” Leo assured. “But it’s a little hard to be mad at him right now. When he’s better, he can expect a full dressing down on the subject. For now, let’s just work to getting to that point.”

Donna was so relieved. She was sure that if circumstances were different right now, this would go in a totally different direction. At least Leo would have a few weeks to process this and get used to the idea before they talked about what it meant for Josh and Donna to be working together. But, of course, for it to get to that point, that meant Josh had to…live.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The President was just about to enter Josh’s room in ICU when he paused, seeing Donna in the window. She was standing by the head of his bed, which was inclined so he could sit up a little. She had her right arm up and running her fingers through his hair, while holding his hand with her left. She leaned over and kissed his forehead. Jed could see that Josh was fighting to keep his eyes opened. She was saying something to him, and he seemed to be desperately trying to hear everything she was saying.

Leo had told him about Josh and Donna’s marriage. He smiled to himself. Josh really was crafty with that one. CJ said they were going to tell Leo about it today. If circumstances were different, Jed wondered what his and Leo’s reaction would have been. He’d like to think it would have been the same that it was now. Stunned; but happy for the most part. They were a good team, they always had been. Whether they got to stay a team at work was going to be a different story.

The President pushed open the door, his eyes trained on Donna’s reaction. She jerked a brief second and seemed to contemplate in a split second whether or not to pull away or stand her ground. She stood her ground. The President was fond of Donna, though he hadn’t really the opportunity to get to know her well yet. She was easily intimidated when he was around, which was not out of the ordinary, most of the assistants were. But that was when he came upon her by herself. When she was with Josh, she had a lot more confidence; and when he was with her, he was a lot easier to deal with. They played off each other’s strengths, and covered each other’s weaknesses.

“Good evening, sir.” she greeted. The President saw that she squeezed Josh’s hand as she said it. “I’m really glad to see you’re up and doing better. I was very worried about you.”

“Thank you, Donna.” he said. “I saw Josh briefly before when they brought him into recovery, he was awake for a minute or so. Is he awake now?”

“Sort of.” she confessed. “He’s sort of drifting in and out. They’ve got him on some pretty powerful drugs.”

The President used his cane to get himself over to the opposite bedside from Donna. He saw that Josh’s eyes, though barely opened, were trained on him.

“SOMEONE has a bit of explaining to do, I think.” the President smiled down to him, and he could just make out the beginnings of a smirk from Josh’s lips. “Someone has orchestrated quite the little coup.”

“Sir...” Donna began, but she trailed off. How could she explain this to the President? How could she stand here with the leader of the free world, who was in a bathrobe no less, and tell him they got drunk and got married? The President looked expectantly up at her. “I guess I really don’t know how to explain it.” she said. “It wasn’t planned. But we just couldn’t ‘fix it’ as CJ had demanded of us. It just kind of happened, and then, well, we realized we were really happy about it. I know you’re probably disappointed --“

“If I’m disappointed in anything, Donnatella, it’s that nobody was able to figure it out.” the President interrupted. “You two have been the picture of professionalism. That’s certainly a point in your favor.”

They both looked down at Josh when they heard him whisper something. Donna leaned down so she could hear him better.

“What’s he saying?” the President asked.

“He said it was all his idea.” she smiled.

“Of that, I have no doubt.” the President chuckled. “Do your parents know about this?”

“Yes, sir.” Donna assured.

“Well, it seems that the rest of the gang downstairs have formulated something of a plan to sneak it through.” the President continued. “So, I don’t think we’ll have too much to worry about it with it. They’ll fill you in, Donna, it’ll take some approval from you, I think. Josh’s plan of getting married BEFORE the inauguration was probably the most ingenious part; that and having Leo actually pick you to work for him.” Another smirk was playing at Josh’s lips. The President turned and started for the door, saying over his shoulder, “I have no doubt you’ll take good care of him, Donna.”

He disappeared through the door and Donna stood watching for a minute before turning back to Josh, who was smiling lightly up at her.

“Told you.” he whispered.

“Yes, of course, you did.” she smiled. “Your brilliance remains uncontroverted.”

“I know.”

“You’re not supposed to be talking.” Donna reminded him.

“Can’t help it.”

“I know. And you say *I* talk too much.” she began to run her fingers through his hair again. “It looks like they might let us keep working together.” He continued to smile up at her and she gazed down at him, trying desperately to keep the tears at bay. “The plumber flooded the kitchen. There’s water everywhere.”

“Shit.”

“Yup. Looks like I get my hardwood floors and tiled kitchen floor after all.”

“Your brilliance remains uncontroverted.” he smiled tossing her words back at her.

“This comes as a surprise to you?”

“Love you, Donnatella.”

“I love you, too, Joshua.”

THE END - Epilogue in chapter 20


	20. Secret, The

~ Epilogue ~

EPILOGUE

“Josh!” Donna called entering their apartment. “I have a surprise for you!”

“Is it a suit so I can go to work?”

“Um, not so much.” she cringed. He was going out of his mind from boredom.

Josh emerged from the bedroom with the scowl on his face that he permanently wore lately. He wasn’t used to all this down time. Of course, he went of physical therapy, and people came to visit him, but he wanted to be back at the White House.

“I’m missing mid-term season.” he grumbled dropping down onto the couch.

“Don’t try to get that by me.” Donna said shaking her head. “I know Toby and Leo call you many, many times a day, and yesterday Toby disappeared. Don’t think I don’t know where he went. You may not be standing in the White House, but I know you aren’t missing mid-terms.

Josh sighed dramatically.

“You’re not going to ask me how my meeting with the President and Leo went?” she asked.

“Oh yeah.” he said quickly. “How’d that go?”

“Why do I think you already KNOW how it went?” she said arching a suspicious brow in his direction

“I don’t, really.” he said, but she saw right through him. He had gotten it out of Leo this morning. He was so stressed out about it that Leo actually took pity on his blood pressure.

“Really?” she said unconvinced. “You didn’t know already that Mandy left and they offered me her job when I graduate.”

“Yeah?” he perked up. He didn’t know that. He knew she was going to be allowed to work with him until she graduated, which was now going to be in the spring instead of December. The university was very good about registering her early for the spring semester, since she had decided to take the semester off at the last minute during Josh’s recovery.

She nodded, and he leaned over and hugged, hoping she didn’t notice the slight wince as he reached for her. She did, but she pretended not to.

“I’m really proud of you, Donna.” he said softly against her ear.

“You’re going to make me cry.” she said with a catch to her voice. “I’ve done too much of that lately.”

“You really have.” he agreed with a sigh and pulled away. “Where’s my surprise?”

She laughed as his boyish enthusiasm came back and pulled out a small bag and handed it to him. He pulled out the DVD inside and smiled.

“Mr. Smith goes to Washington.”

“I know it’s your favorite.”

“Well, how can it not be? He makes all those amazing speeches...” Josh trailed off smiling.

“I love when he talks about the Lincoln Memorial and says Lincoln’s just sitting there, waiting for you stop by.” Donna laughed.

“Thank you.” Josh smiled. Of course, it was only going to keep him occupied for two hours, but he liked the thought of the two hours of quiet time with Donna.

“What state do you think he’s from?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Arkansas?”

“Arkansas! Why do you think that?”

“He talks about rolling plains.”

“You crack me up!”

“That’s MY line.”

“Put the movie in, Abner.”

“Speaking of Abner...” Josh trailed.

“Oh God, did he get out?”

“No, but I can’t get him out from underneath the bed.”

“What happened?”

“Well, do you know how you said I should try my hand at vacuuming?”

“Yeah?” she asked with dread.

“Didn’t work out too well for him.”

“Joshua!”

“I think he’s all right.”

“Try cooking instead.”

“All right. But you know Bambi likes to jump up on the counters.”

“That’s what the squirt bottle is for.”

“I didn’t think I was allowed to use it.”

“You’re allowed to use it when she does something bad. You used it every time she walks in the room.”

“Well, it’s funny.” he defended. “She gets all freaked out about it. Maybe she’ll stay off my pillow.”

“Don’t forget, my mother’s coming tomorrow.”

“She’s going to smack me in the head.”

“Probably.”

“Why does everyone smack ME in the head? Sam messes up way more.”

“It’s fun to smack you in the head.”

“You crack me up.”

THE END 

(There is an alternate ending to this story also on this site. Called The Secret - Alternate ending. It'll start from chapter 16).


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